Kenneth Koch's Conversation

Often in life, one looks back on previous days with fondness. Having garnered wisdom, past experiences and decisions can be reflected upon in a new light. Having lost that time forever, times past are more often than not clouded by happiness and nostalgia. Such is the theme for Kenneth Koch's poem "To My Twenties." As a man looking back on a "Fantastic unheard of nine- or ten-year oasis" (Line 8), this narrator reflects on carefree and innocent times with increasing nostalgia in a deceptively conversational tone of voice.

The narrator looks back on this period of his life and refers to it as a time "When everything was possible" (Line 2). He recalls himself as being "Unsure of himself, upset and unemployable" (Line 13). Koch does remarkable work in this poem as he pits a narrator reflecting on a bygone era in his life. Knowing that several decades have past since this seemingly carefree decade, this narrator is able to think deeply about his mindset, life choices, and appreciation for what life was able to give him in his twenties.

Taking the post-modern approach of exploring the quotidian while eschewing a grand, unifying narrative, Koch's poem is written in conversational language arranged in poetic lines. Although the tone is light and the word choices are conversational, Koch explores very profound themes. He writes, "In you I marry,// In you I first go to France; I make my best friends// In you, and a few enemies" (Lines 23-25). He even goes so far as to ask, "Although now that I look back on you// What part have you played?" (Lines 32-33). While pointing out very obvious facts such as the twenties falling between the teens and thirties, it is with that device that Koch is able to focus on the beauty of reflection. When his narrator bumps into a friend on the street who asks if he has time for a chat the narrator replies, "I am in my twenties!// I have plenty of time!" (Lines 22-23).

Through the disguise of simple poetry, Koch creates a very powerful reflection on early life. Recalling his past with increasing nostalgia, Koch is able to utilize the wisdom of his narrator to reflect on what is most important in life and when. He concludes his poem with the following seven lines:

What you gave me you gave me whole
But as for telling
Me how best to use it
You weren't a genius at that.
Twenties, my soul
Is yours for the asking
You know that, if you ever come back.

These lines offer a prime example of how the simplicity of verse in this poem continues to illustrate profound themes. Knowing through experience how better to live life, this narrator would still return to these blissful years if only they were to ask.

Empty Space

For Anne Waldman, there is no real or singular identity to existence. Believing that we know things only through the knowledge of other things, the poet believes that the universe is not a stable object. In her poem "Makeup on Empty Space", Waldman brings these themes to life in an extended, gendered metaphor, utilizing the material adornment makeup to fill a void. 

In her poem, Waldman seeks to explore her belief that everything in this world is mere appearance. The "empty space" that she describes should stand for anything in the universe that humans come into contact with. This poem uses the metaphor of makeup to illustrate the passing nature of phenomenal experience. Painting on makeup is the same action of adorning the universe in any way, which Waldman sees as ephemeral and fleeting. 

Anne Waldman views adornment of the universe, for the sake of her poem, makeup, as a conflict between material culture and the philosophical goals of the Buddhism she practices. Indeed, this poem in itself is an act of putting makeup on empty space. It is an act of decorating the universe through language. 

“Makeup on Empty Space” is a very unique poem. Using heavy repetition, Anne Waldman strengthens her point by describing the ultimate futility of adorning fleeting aspects of daily existence. Written as a type of performance, the text here is used in order to promote that performance.

The narrator of this poem “binds” several things throughout it. She binds the “massive rock”, the “hanging night.” Using this set of repeating action verbs, Ann Waldman explores further her universal refrain. Putting makeup on  an empty space, Ann Waldman shows that the universe is an entity without an identity and something whose adornment is a futile and ephemeral experience.

The Simple Life

A member of the "Beat" Poets, Gary Snyder is a man whose poetry is characterized by simple language and the freedom of self-expression. His poem "Mid-August at Sourdough Mountain Lookout" is no exception to this spontaneous and free-spirited writing style. The narrator of this poem looks out from atop a soaring height down to the beautiful nature below, all the while thinking of past memories and the appreciation he has for his solitude.

The first stanza of this poem is rife with meditation. Snyder's lines flow smoothly in a trace like state. Describing the scene that he views from above, the narrator states, "Down valley a smoke haze/three days heat, after five days rain" (Lines 1-2). These simple observances are what illustrate the nature of this poem. The simplicity of the verses is deliberate and speaks to the fact that  they were written by a man whose appreciation for nature is apparent in his poetry. Snyder even appreciates "Swarms of new flies" (Line 5) and the way the "Pitch glows on the fir-cones" (Line 3).

After his lines of praise to nature, Snyder begins to explore the psychology of the narrator. He writes, "I cannot remember things I once read/A few friends, but they are in cities" (Lines 6-7). For this man, appreciation for a world outside of man's influence leaves a greater impression. It is in the simple life that this narrator finds his greatest happiness. He recalls "Drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup/Looking down for miles" (Lines 8-9).  These natural sights create more of an impact on his memory and way of life than any man or book possibly could.

The facet of life that brings the narrator the most happiness is living it simply and austerely. Gone is the pressure of friends and city life. Snyder writes of a narrator who embraces the simplicity of nature as opposed to the ephemeral power of material possessions. This man lives among the trees and among the flies, away from friends whom he can hardly recall. Even "things [he] once read" (Line 6) were unable to form a lasting impression as powerful as drinking snow or gazing down a valley filled with new flies. In this poem, Snyder hails the power of the simple life and its profound effect on a man who chose to pursue it. the beat poets may have embraced a sort of "counterculture", but the counterculture that this narrator chases after is one more natural and inherently human than any life in cities or among friends may hope to suggest.

Learning from Nature

Very much in the vein of the Romantic poets, the poetry of Walt Whitman speaks of a special and internal connection with nature. Formed from the atoms of the earth, the speaker of Whitman's poem "Song of Myself" describes how through careful observance, "the origin of poems" (Line 36) as well as "the good of the earth and sun" (Line 37) can be easily possessed.

The speaker describes that "every atom of [his] blood" is "formed from this soil, this air" (Line 6). This narrator is a creature of nature just like anything else. Formed from the bare minerals of the earth that keeps him alive, this speaker is an entity with a strong connection to natural splendor. He asks his audience, "Have you reckon'd a thousand acres much? Have you reckon'd the earth much?" (Line 33). Through the observance of the earth and her acres, the speaker begins to suggest that possession of intimate knowledge (which he describes later) can be achieved.

Whitman creates a speaker who appreciates the minutiae ignored by the common masses. He elegantly states in a serious of statements careful observances from his daily life outdoors. He says, "The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag" (Line 29), "The smoke of my own breath" (Line 21), "The feeling of health" (Line 31) "The delight alone or in the rush of streets" (Line 30). This person is someone who takes a positive stance on how to look at and how to appreciate the beauty of the world around us. Simply by his notice, the world seems to be more beautiful and something to hold very dear.

Walt Whitman is a poet known for his descriptions and connections with nature. Although he sounds like the Romantics, Whitman's view of Nature seems to be more primal in essence. He's more like Keats than Shelley in that sense. Gone is the embellished language of yesteryear to make way for a natural poetry that mirrors the natural world that it describes. The experience of nature is what Whitman hails, not the escape from reality through nature. For this narrator of this poem, observing the natural world that constructs our reality is what makes him sing.

Hope at the End of the Century

Known for such piercing works of tragedy as Tess of the D'Ubervilles and Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy has never been one for the faint of heart. This distinction remains true in his poem "The Darkling Thrush" written at the end of the 19th century. Pitting a narrator against a desolate landscape with a "beruffled" (Line 22) and singing bird, Hardy uses this juxtaposition to show that natural creatures may know of a happiness far away from suffering that humanity will never understand.

Very much in the same vein as John Keats and Bysshe Shelley, Hardy shows a narrator defined by his predilection to unhappiness who finds comfort in the song of a bird. Referring to the features of the land as "Century's corpse" (Line 10), this narrator is one whose outlook on life at the end of this particular year is not very positive. Every natural occurrence that he feels or sees serves as a reminder that time is passing and hope for the hopeless doesn't seem to be coming any time soon.

It is not until he hears the "evensong" (Line 19) of sickly looking bird that he begins to think more deeply on the nature of happiness. Describing his song as one of "joy illimited" (Line 20), the narrator feels that this bird knows of a happiness of which "[he] is unaware" (Line 24). Although the ending stanza of this poem is one that may offer a glimmer of hope for mankind, the narrator ponders how this creature can know joy in such a terrible land and time. Here, Hardy is speaking very much toward the nature of humanity during this time in the world. Filled with despair and finding joy in nothing, this narrator may enjoy the song of this bird yet will never be able to attain its carefree joviality.

This poem serves as an example to show the nature of suffering and the appreciation of nature. Like Keats and Shelley, Hardy uses a singing bird to show the way a narrator can be moved both mentally and spiritually out of a gloom ridden life. To learn the nature of this bird's happiness is something that humans could never comprehend, but the joy that it brings is something to respect, appreciate and desire.

Ephemeral Power

After having achieved the distinction of being in power and wielding control over one's own subjects, it would be difficult to imagine that the elevated political status should ever disappear. Such an idea sets the stage for the main theme of Percy Bysshe Shelley's famous sonnet "Ozymandias." Presumably having a statue erected in his honor himself, the only memory of this once powerful ruler is broken stone, sunk into the earth where "the lone and level sands stretch far away" (Line 14).

For many a dictator or ruler, power gives them the authority to live a certain type of lifestyle. Being in control of an empire of subjects has had the historical tendency to go directly to the head of the rulers who wield the control. As Shelley describes of this king Ozymandias whose only memory lies vacant in a desert, power more often than not seems to disappear after the subject who hails it has died. On the statue of this king reads, "My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;//Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!"  (Lines 10-11).

The casual irony with which Shelley constructs this poem cannot be lost on the audience. Here may stand the remnants of a statue that continues to embody the character of its subject, yet the "Works" (Line 11) that the king wishes its bearer to hail no longer remain. Indeed, even the comprehension of the language with which the inscription was written would be lost on the modern "traveller" (Line 1) who discovered this "shattered visage" (Line 4). While his face may remain in tact enough for a stranger to comprehend his demeanor, the actions of King Ozymandias no longer hold any weight now that his empire is lost.

Power can only last for a certain amount of time, and the tendency for these rulers to believe themselves to be immortal is the greatest irony of all. Because this poem was published just before Napoleon's death, an apt comparison can be made to this ruler who held immense power during his life, but whose influence waned almost entirely by the time of his death. Just as the land around the statue of King Ozymandias is "boundless and bare" (Line 13), so too is the haughty superiority with which many an emperor has looked down upon his subjects. Only time can know how long the ephemeral nature of influence will last, and the "sneer of cold command" (Line 5) that characterizes pompous rulers will die along with their impermanent supremacy.

The Failure of Man

To attain the freedom of the beings of nature and the endless happiness that fills their days has often been the dream of many a man and poet. Such is the case for Percy Bysshe Shelley in his famous poem "To a Skylark". Hailing this creature with the ability to live away from the restrictions and unhappiness of daily drudgery, this skylark is a being whose elevation over the souls of man knows not the sufferings that humans face every day.

Though the speaker of the poem highlights the skylark's ability to remain unhindered by ennui, sadness and having the capacity to think deeper and more beautiful thoughts, he acknowledges the fact that man will probably never be able to attain even half the joy that this striking bird must know. Shelley concludes the poem with a plead to this skylark saying, "Teach me half the gladness/That thy brain must know,/Such harmonious madness/From my lips would flow,/The world should listen then--as I am listening now" (Lines 101-105).

Even half of the joy that fills the soul of this bird would be enough for the speaker to teach the world how to live life more happily. If only humanity should connect with Nature on the level that it understands the important aspects of life could man attain the freedom of this skylark. Yet, because this is impossible, man fails to elevate itself to this higher, more natural level.

It is indescribable for this speaker to realize the liberty of this skylark, or to accomplish teaching its message to the masses. Even after comparing this bird to a "poet" (Line 36), a "high-born maiden" (Line 41), a "Glow-worm" (Line 46) and a "rose" (Line 51) in a catalog of similes, the speaker fails to accurately depict the essence of the symbol that Shelley has chosen.

Shelley describes this bird to be like a spirit from heaven, singing on high above all creation, impervious to the sadness and pain that humanity knows all too well. In his praise of this bird, the speaker of Shelley's poem comes to the conclusion that he has failed to not only describe the spirit of this bird, but has also failed to accomplish living up to its freedom. There is a reason why poets look to Nature for inspiration. The natural world can teach man how to live in harmony, beauty, and freedom from sadness and stress. Shelley explores a realistic scenario in this poem. Man may highlight nature as a teacher and as a muse, but the reality is that man will never be able to live up to what nature has to teach, or even half of what it can teach us because humanity is too wrapped up in itself and in its own suffering.

Escape for Keats

There can be no question that life presents many disagreeable scenarios. Be it the loss of a friend, a failure to succeed, a dishonor upon the family, the need to escape from despair into bliss can be achieved by a wide variety of choices and decisions. In his famous and remarkable work "Ode to a Nightingale", John Keats offers such forms of fleeing from anguish into pleasure for a narrator dissatisfied with his lot in life.

Written to a singing bird in the trees, Keats's poem explores a variety of methods for a man to escape from a life with which he is discontented. Beginning his poem with "My heart aches" (Line 1), Keats presents his narrator as unhappy from the commencement. Wishing to simply forget his life and be one with the carefree bird who sings his immortal song, the narrator explores various ways in which he might succeed in leaving his troubled mind behind throughout the work.

The first scenario that the narrator explores is escape through imbibing alcohol. He longs for a "draught of vintage!" (Line 11) so "That [he] might drink and leave the world unseen,/And with thee fade away into the forest dim" (Lines 19-20). Dissatisfied with this choice and remaining jealous of the bird who "hast never known/The weariness, the fever, and the fret" (Lines 22-23) that he has, the narrator instead turns to the beauty and timelessness of poetry. He hails its "viewless wings" (32), but his sight continues to fail him as the night grows on and still his mind is filled with despair.

The most powerful form of escape for this narrator lies in flight forever from this world through death. The narrator proclaims that "for many a time/[He] has been half in love with easeful Death" (Lines 52-52) and that "Now more than ever seems it rich to die" (Line 55). It seems that for this man, only through death will his soul be able to discover peace, away from the pain and suffering that torments his days. He even exalts dying as taking him away with "no pain" (Line 56).

Interestingly enough, the narrator, though he hails these forms of escape while remaining envious of the bird who is able to eschew suffering, never takes action with any of them. He fashions his escape through intoxication, death, poetry and dreaming, but never does he drink, commit suicide or escape his reality. His thoughts stray to these forms, but he takes no concrete action other than escape through his imagination.

Keats explores psychology as well as the beauty and tenacity of language in this poem. This is a remarkably human story that finds its purpose in that escape from this world is only too hard to achieve and the forlorn fancies of pursuing contentment are nearly impossible to come by.

Wordsworth's Power of Nature

Nature's power and beauty is difficult to refute. Natural splendor in all of its forms is both pleasing to the eyes and stimulating to the soul. It was common for the Romantic poet to incorporate Nature as a theme in his poems for these and for other reasons. Nature has a transforming power and, for Wordsworth, that power may offer pleasure both in the present sight as well as the recalled memory.

In his poem "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud", Wordsworth's narrator floats above a beautiful and vast expanse of daffodils. So infinite is the view, that the speaker claims that it is "Continuous as the stars that shine/And twinkle on the milky way" (Lines 7-8). So powerful is the image of these marvelous flora, that even the waves of the bay can't outdo their "sprightly dance" (Line 12). 

While the speaker's appreciation is evident due to the manner in which he describes the view he sees, it is not until he reflects upon the experience that he truly realizes the effect of what he saw.He says, "I gazed--and gazed--but little thought/What wealth the show to me had brought" (Lines 17-18). Here, though he claims that the experience did not bring him much to note while seeing it, he seems to know that upon reflection and consideration, the dancing daffodils will haunt his memory forever. After saying that while lounging, thinking deeply or thinking of nothing at all, the daffodils "flash upon that inward eye" (Line 21). Wordsworth ends the poem with the couplet "And then my heart with pleasure fills/And dances with the daffodils" (Lines 23-24).

Nature's power is one so great as to have an effect on human mood and emotion. The view that the expanse of daffodils afforded to the speaker is one that lives on in his memory, even when he is not seeking to remember it. In any mood, be it "vacant" or "pensive" (Line 20), the memory of this natural experience made a profound impact on mind of the speaker. The profundity of nature is what Wordsworth explores in this poem, and he does so by showing how a simple view of daffodils surrounding a bay affected the spirit of the narrator forever. Natural beauty has a power to which no man made object can possibly compare. One may remember the sight of a beautiful house, a painting, or an elegant piece of furniture, but natural splendor has an effect on the mind and on the soul that words cannot really justify. Wordsworth explores the psyche of a narrator deeply changed by the view he once saw, and that universal theme speaks to the fact that nature's power is one that can never be refuted.

Missing Time for Wordsworth

A poet's use of line breaks is often a deliberate construction used to signify an important meaning within the greater theme of the text as a whole. In William Wordsworth's "A slumber did my spirit seal", the author uses this construction. One may often think that a poem so brief in length could not contain much significant meaning, yet Wordsworth tells a beautiful and tragic love story spanning a unknown number of years in eight simple lines.

It is in the lack on concrete detail that Wordsworth tells the greatest story in this poem. Beginning his poem from perspective of a smitten lover, Wordsworth shows a narrator fascinated by his lover, thinking she can never age or die. He writes, "She seem'd a thing that could not feel/The touch of earthly years" (Lines 3-4). So immortal did she seem that death never crossed the speaker's mind. Impervious to age, a shock comes in the next stanza when the audience learns that she dies. Moving from eternity to morality by a pause that offers no information is how Wordsworth constructs this poem.

Wordsworth opens the second and final stanza with, "No motion has she now, no force/She neither hears nor sees" (Lines 5-6). This jump is certainly an abrupt one considering the fact that just a blank space before, the beloved was not only alive, but unaffected by death. Yet, as stated above, it is  truly in this gap that Wordsworth builds the tragedy of this tale. One cannot know what surpassed in the missing time, so the possibilities are infinite.

The structure that Wordsworth utilizes offers an analysis that a more traditional ballad structure cannot. Here, the absence of story creates the possibility for numerous other ones. Instead of spinning a traditional tragedy spanning decades that many other of his contemporaries might have done, Wordsworth instead writes a simple poem packed with beautiful meaning and despair. Having a narrator separated from the fears of natural humans who is in love with a woman he views as immortal, only to have reality come crashing onto them both is a tale that one would think must take place in more than eight lines of poetry. There lies the genius of Wordsworth's writing and what sets this poem apart from many others in this period.

Art Imitating Life for William Blake

In both "The Lamb" and "The Tyger", William Blake seeks to understand from whence these creatures came to be. Using a certain simplicity of verse, Blake creates two poems whose tone reflects the nature of the creatures that he is describing. In "The Lamb", Blake creates a tone that encourages a thoughtful gentleness that mirrors the nature of the lamb whose origin he questions,whereas in "The Tyger", Blake illustrates the exotic, fearful nature of this beautiful and mysterious creature with powerful imagery.

When one thinks of the nature of a lamb, pastoral imagery might come to mind. Meadows filled with natural splendor bear witness to the calm innocence of the lambs that inhabit it. Blake captures this essence in his poem by calling into question who made this beautiful lamb and adding beautiful imagery with his interrogation. He remarks the lamb's "tender voice" (Line 7) his "softest clothing wooly bright" (Line 6) and how he has the power to make "all the vales rejoice" (Line 8). The imagery that these phrases evoke call to mind the innocent nature of this animal, and that is the tone with which Blake creates this poem. Linking the lamb to Jesus Christ, Blake refers to the animal as "meek" and "mild" (Line 15), just like the young Christ. In this poem, art truly imitates life by calling to mind the innocence and simplicity of the tender animal who lends its name to Blake's text.

For "The Tyger", Blake uses the same approach of using the animal's nature to frame the tone of his poem, but the imagery and attitude that he creates could not be more different. Commencing the work with "Tyger Tyger, burning bright/In the forests of the night" (Lines 1-2), Blake begins with a strong statement as to the powerful presence that this creature evokes. Questioning who could frame the creature's "fearful symmetry" (Line 4), Blake is not as able as he was in his previous poem to link this animal to the "meek" and "mild" Christ child described earlier. Indeed, Blake questions who could "dare" to create an animal as ferocious as this "tyger" several times throughout the poem. With its fiery eyes and sinewy heart, Blake wonders, "Did he who made the lamb make thee?" (Line 20).

In both of these poems, Blake questions the origins of the creatures who entitle his works. While one may attest quite early that the same entity should have created both, the difference in demeanor, appearance and attitude of both creatures suggests otherwise to this poet. Both poems use the same poetic device of echoing the tone to the nature of the animal: The lamb being gentle and comforting, while the tiger is wild and outlandish. These poems are a true representation of art imitating life, and Blake links the tone of these poems perfectly to the nature of the animals who entitle them.

Sarcasm in Renaissance Poetry

For all of the sonnets praising a lover's beauty or hailing love as immortal as the rhymes that describe it, there are works of poetry whose themes stray in a completely opposite direction. Andrew Marvell's famous poem "To His Coy Mistress" takes the latter approach, satirizing love poetry in a compelling and dark portrait of the futility of remaining chaste for too long. While following poetic conventions like rhyme scheme and the structure of the verses, the content of Marvell's poem explores a darker side of courtship that is not often touched on in poems from this era.

Using a logical structure in three stanzas, Marvell creates a compelling, if not disturbing argument as to why his lover's remaining chaste for too long will result in pragmatic unhappiness for both parties. Marvell's use of sarcasm begins in the first stanza of the poem in which he introduces his argument. While maintaining the poetic conventions of the time for praising the beauty of a lover, Marvell's idealizing here speaks to the sarcastic tone of the stanza. He says that if time were no object, he would spend ages adoring different parts of her body. He says, "An hundred years should go to praise/Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;/Two hundred to adore each breast;/But thirty thousand to the rest" (Lines 13-16). The preposterous amount of time he should spend on these minute aspects of his lover's appearance speaks to the parody with which he writes these lines.

It is in the second stanza that Marvell begins to explain the dire consequences of the coquettish nature of this chaste lover. He begins with the famous couplet, "But at my back I always hear/Time's winged chariot hurrying near;" (Lines 21-22). While in the first stanza he proposes the hypothetical scenario in which time is of no consequence, he moved on to a more realistic argument in which he divines that this waiting will bear no contentment either for him, or for this coy mistress. He says, "worms shall try/That long preserved virginity" (Lines 27-28), a macabre reference to the in tact hymen with which is mistress lay buried which now only worms can enjoy.

Marvell's use of sarcasm in this poem speaks to the frustration that many men must have felt toward puritan and prudish social conventions. Using language that should be meant to proclaim the pure divinity of the beauty of his mistress, Marvell instead uses this same language in a sarcastic tone that chastises the archaic practices of a woman's affected coy nature.

The Power and Immortality of Beauty

Using a strict form and following the structure that he himself created, William Shakespeare's sonnets have proven to have withstood the test of the ages. Much like the themes of some of his poetry, Shakespeare's sonnets have shown themselves to be timeless and universal, much like the themes that comprise them. In his famous "Sonnet 18", Shakespeare compares the beauty of a person, often thought to be an anonymous young man, to a "summer's day" (Line 1). This young man proves to be more beautiful than even the most temperate of all the seasons in addition to being more static and unchanging. The poem concludes with the famous couplet, "So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee" (Lines 13-14). While brief, this poem explores a multitude of themes which include, beauty, Nature, aging and immortality. Indeed, this poem brings about the age old fascination of eternal beauty, but does not evoke this theme in the same fashion as "Sonnet 55", whose speaker alludes to the immortality of his rhyme (his art). The fortunate, eternal beauty of the person to whom "Sonnet 18" is addressed is simply rife with a beauty more powerful and beautiful than Nature and time together. He or she does not have to work for this distinction, and its truth is an aspect to which all men can attest simply by bearing witness to its veracity. Not only is this beauty natural, but it is also extremely powerful. The addressee has the power to be more stable than the summer sun, never too hot, and his or her "eternal summer" (Line 9) can outshine even death himself. Normally, when confronted with beauty and perfection so extreme, one would wonder, but at what cost? Shakespeare makes no allusion to any negative consequence that this beauty might conjure, and its objective truth is given such unanimous praise that even men and "eternal lines to time" can do nothing but bow before it as auspicious spectators. Beauty is a theme as timeless as poetry and its power is as strong as the subjects that it so often evokes. Shakespeare's sonnets are rife with allusions toward immortality and timeless beauty, but "Sonnet 18" is one whose famous lines have withstood the test of time, much like the fortunate person to whom the verses are addressed.