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The forward violet thus did I chide:
Sweet theefe whence didst thou steale thy sweet that smels
If not from my loves breath; the purple pride
Which on thy soft cheeke for complexion dwells,
In my loves veines thou hast too grosely dyed.
The Lillie I condemned for thy hand,
And buds of marjerom had stolne thy haire,
The Roses fearefully on thornes did stand
One blushing shame, an other white dispaire:
A third nor red, nor white, had stolne of both,
And to his robbry had annext thy breath,
But for his theft in pride of all his growth
A vengfull canker eate him up to death.
More flowers I noted, yet I none could see,
But sweet or culler it had stolne from thee.
Commentary
Commentary
Address to his beloved
Address to his beloved
Changes to the original text: end of line 1, comma changed to colon; line 3, semicolon inserted after 'breath'; end of line 3, comma deleted; end of line 4, question mark replaced by comma; line 5, 'died' changed to 'dyed'; end of line 5, comma changed to full stop; line 9, 'our' changed to 'one'
In the first verse, the poet chides the violet firstly with having stolen his beloved's sweet breath, and secondly with having stolen his (the beloved's) blood to tint her petals.
In the seond vese, the poet condemns the lily for having stolen the beloved's hand and the marjoram his hair. The white and red roses are also arraigned.
In the third verse the white and red rose is accused, but has been punished with a canker for its transgressions. In general, the white and red (damask) rose would indicate the beloved, but here the fact that the poet writes 'had annext thy breath', the 'thy' referring to his beloved, it cannot be that the beloved has 'annext' his own breath. The red (shame) and white (despair) roses in the previous quatrain therefore apply to the poet's male and female lovers. The red and white rose in this quatrain must therefore apply to the poet himself, who is punished for his theft: 'in pride of all his growth / A vengfull canker eate him up to death'. Little doubt that the 'canker' is syphilis.
In the final couplet, the poet remarks that he has seen other flowers, and all are guilty of theft from his beloved.
The sonnet as a whole passes from simple floral metaphors to hard emotions and back again: 'As events intrinsically evil or horrible take on an added dimension of horror when related by an innocent or ingenuous person unaware of the implications of the facts he narrates, so do these lines produce a frisson because of their appearance of being about a caterpillar on a rose, when in reality they are about syphilis in a man.' (Green, Martin, The Labyrinth of Shakepseare's Sonnets, London 1974, p41)
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