Summary

As in so many other sonnets, the poet’s annoyance with the young man is expressed ambiguously. We hardly notice that he rebukes the youth in the lines “That god forbid that made me first your slave / I should in thought control your times of pleasure.” Surely the suggestion is that the poet will not complain of his neglect: “And patience, tame to sufferance, bide each check / Without accusing you of injury.” Nor does he expect an accounting of the youth’s time. Still, an injury is implied: “I am to wait, though waiting so be hell, / Not blame your pleasure, be it ill or well.” Moreover, “self-doing crime” implies that the youth hurts not only the poet but himself as well. If nothing else, however, the poet’s dignity is slighted.