Sonnet 30
1. When to the Sessions of sweet silent thought,
2. I summon up remembrance of things past,
3. I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
4. And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste:
5. Then can I drown an eye (unused to flow)
6. For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
7. And weep afresh love's long since cancell'd woe,
8. And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight:
9. Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
10. And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
11. The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
12. Which I new pay as if not paid before.
13. But if the while I think on thee (dear friend)
14. All losses are restored and sorrows end.
Losses Restored
Dedication: To Henry
Explaining to Henry those moments that he allows his darkest and most dreaded thoughts and memories to surface, of the wrongs and woes committed against him, he merely thinks of Henry and those sorrows end.
1st Quatrain: (1-4)
Reflecting on this great dissappointment.
2nd Quatrain: (5-8)
Referring to Henry again in line 6 with the reference to the precious friends. Telling her how he cries anew over this in line 7 and suffers it in line 8.
3rd Quatrain: (9-12)
Reflecting on the everlasting hurt of this injury.
couplet (13-14),
Telling Henry that thoughts of him are his only consoling force.
Commentary:
Oxford again addressing Henry in the semi familiar context of his “friend” which as seen has been used as a means to refer to him even when Henry was very young as in sonnet 104.
The nature of the start as a discussion of the things the poet sought and did not receive is none to mysterious by now. However this sonnet ties several important things together if they weren’t already clear. Line 6 speaking of “precious friends hid in death's dateless night” is an important way of understanding that the person he refers to as “friend” whom we’ve known since 149 is also what lies hidden from 142 and the nature of that hiding place is an appointment with death from 31. Line 11 reflects that the woe of this sonnet has been heard before, an understatement of course but a clear indication of the prominence of the subject matter. But most interesting is that this poem is actually addressed to the friend as we learn in line 13. Thus this truly be a “Fair Youth” sonnet though I think it is instrumental to point out the nowhere here is the subject being asked to marry, procreate, or is there any mention of his mortality. Which is important for pointing out in this relatively rare instance where the poet addresses this youth for certain and what I would maintain is the even rarer instance where the youth is expected to understand.