Sonnet 28

1. How can I then return in happy plight,

2. That am debarr'd the benefit of rest?

3. When day's oppression is not eased by night,

4. But day by night, and night by day, oppress'd.

5. And each (though enemies to either's reign)

6. Do in consent shake hands to torture me,

7. The one by toil, the other to complain

8. How far I toil, still farther off from thee.

9. I tell the Day, to please him thou art bright,

10. And dost him grace when clouds do blot the heaven:

11. So flatter I the swart-complexion'd night,

12. When sparkling stars twire not thou gild'st the even.

13. But day doth daily draw my sorrows longer

14. And night doth nightly make grief's strength seem stronger.

My Grief's Strength

Dedication: To Elizabeth

In an effort to explain his turmoil and the torment of his existence explains how he is both tortured day and night. Mentioning as well his likely metaphorical separation and distance from Elizabeth.

1st Quatrain: (1-4)

Expressing his constant agony.

2nd Quatrain: (5-8)

Referring to both he and Elizabeth's motivations at odds over the monarchy. His to acquire it while hers to not upset her own. 3rd

Quatrain: (9-12)

He praises the day that shines despite the clouds and then he flatters the night with the stars that twinkle though it is Elizabeth that provides the heavens shine.

couplet (13-14),

Both day and night torment him because of this tragedy visited on him


Commentary:

This sonnet appears to answer rhetorically against the notion that Oxford must be expected to return to Court and display a congenial disposition. While this poem is not immediately obvious as to Elizabeth it is my contention that Oxford wrote this to her to express the toll and agony she has caused him. Furthermore this poem likely expresses the separation of Oxford from Elizabeth at the latter stages of his life.

It is interesting that the poet speaks of his toil. It has long been a proposition of many Oxfordians that Oxford’s retreat to Hackney was to pursue his writing. While it is my belief this was not the reason. I do believe that is what he did. Whether to distract him or to do what I believe he might have been motivated to do. To truly make himself a writer of such renown that his work would be timeless and would facilitate the memorialization of his son and his son’s secret.

Vendler calls this sonnet an improbable and contrived fable only to further elaborate that this was necessary because of the impossibility to speak candidly to the beloved.

I would offer instead that the poet is by now feeling both oppressed and tormented at this late stage of his life as he frets of the demise of Elizabeth without Henry’s recognition.