Sonnet 94 by Shakespeare

Sonnet 94 is one of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. It's a member of the Fair Youth sequence, in which the poet expresses his love towards a young man.

Synopsis
Sonnet 94 is seen as being particularly difficult to interpret. Shakespeare describes a restrained and cold person who has the "power to hurt" but who does not exercise that power. The first two quatrains describe a person who is coldly detached and slow to temptation. This person, the speaker argues, is therefore more likely to inherit the gifts of heaven.
 * They rightly do inherit heaven's graces
 * And husband nature's riches from expense;

In the third quatrain, the sonnet then shifts abruptly to a description of a flower, which most scholars believe to be one of Shakespeare's patrons. Shakespeare describes the summer as treasuring the flower - "to the summer sweet", with the flower living unaware of its beauty "Though to itself it only live and die,". This quatrain serves as an attempted explanation for the patron's "unmoved, cold" nature to allow Shakespeare to continue loving him and give him peace of mind. However the speaker reluctantly admits that the young man is guilty of harmful deeds, a "base infection", and is therefore lower (smells worse) than weeds. The last line appeared earlier in Act II of Edward III, which was published 13 years prior to the sonnets. Although the line is based on a proverb, the exact wording of the line is not that of the proverb, and is identical in the play and the sonnet.

Interpretations

 * actress Siân Phillips, for the 2002 compilation album, When Love Speaks (EMI Classics)
 * read by actress and singer Liza Minnelli in the song If There Was Love (written by Pet Shop Boys) for her 1989 album Results, although saying, incorrectly, "And husband's natures" at line 6.