Sonnet 18

Shakespeare’s use of a season as an analogy prepares the reader for the sense that the speaker is experiencing something that will not last. In Line 4, this sense of ephemerality becomes clear: “And summer’s lease hath all too short a date,” meaning what is present and true now will not be so in a few months. In Lines 5-7, the speaker describes how the excitement derived from love and beauty often calms. What is “[s]ometime too hot” (Line 5) often becomes “dimm’d” (Line 6) and “sometime declines” (Line 7). The poet’s usage of the adverb “sometime” in Lines 5 and 7 describes how infatuations can be especially passionate, but people can also entirely lose interest in a beloved. On the other hand, what initially appears to be “gold” (Line 6)—a metaphor for early idealizations—“often” (Line 6) fades. With the use of the adverb “often,” there is an expression of greater certainty, as lovers seldom share as much interest in each other during the later stages of a romance as they did at the beginning.