Cummings Study Guide

Sonnet 3 Meaning

......Look in a mirror and tell yourself that now is the time to beget a child (“form another"). There is no woman, after all, who is so outstanding that she will refuse to marry you and engage in intimate relations. It is not right that a man should love only himself, refusing to take a wife and pass on his good qualities to a child. Your mother bequeathed to you your excellent attributes, and you in turn should bestow them on your own child, who will reflect your youth when you are old. If you choose not to marry and have a family, no one will remember you. 

Sonnet 9 Meaning

......The first two lines ask whether the young man is afraid to marry for fear that he will leave behind a saddened widow when he eventually dies. If he remains single because of that fear, the sonnet says, he should keep in mind that the world itself will weep for him because he died without children to preserve his image in them. He will become less than a wastrel, who lives on after his death in the still-circulating money that he spent. Shakespeare ends the sonnet by saying that the young man’s avoidance of marriage is shameful. 

Sonnet 12 Meaning

......The toll or tick of a clock, the setting sun, withering flowers,  falling leaves, the autumn harvest all make me aware of the passing of time, reminding me that you (the young man) too will grow old and die. Therefore, now, while you are still young, you should marry and breed (have children) who will live on after you. Only in this way can you defeat death.

.......Will future readers of my verse believe me when I tell them about all of your superior qualities? So far, I have only hinted at these qualities because a full description of them would make readers doubt that anyone could have such extraordinary attributes.  They would call me a liar. They would say I am exaggerating (with “stretched meter"). However, if you marry and father a child, people will see a reflection of you in the child and, thus, my poetry about you will be taken as the truth. 

.......This sonnet is presented and explained on the main page (The Sonnet: A Study Guide). It is probably the most popular of all the sonnets because of the beauty of its poetry and rhythm. It is differs from the previous 17 sonnets in one key respect: It does not urge the young man to marry and have children. The reason for this new approach is that the author is now convinced that his poetry alone is enough to preserve the memory of the young man's outstanding qualities. 

.......Even though my mirror tells me that I am aging, the poet says, I will not grow old while you remain young. However, when I see wrinkles (“time’s furrows") on your face, then I will look for death to come for me and take me as payment for any offenses I may have committed in my life. Your heart and mine are bound together, and I will guard yours as carefully as a nurse caring for a baby. But do not presume that you will be unaffected when my heart is no longer able to beat for you. Here, the poet appears to be warning the young man that ending their relationship would have adverse consequences.

.......This sonnet is a metaphor that compares the young man to the sun. In the morning the sun turns its “sovereign eye" (light) on the mountaintops, then on the green meadows and streams. (In other words, when all is well between the poet and the young man, everything is cheerful and bright.) However, dark clouds come between the sun and the earth (just as a barrier–perhaps a disagreement–has apparently come between the two men). Then, obscured by the clouds, the sun continues on its daily journey across the sky. Nevertheless, the poet says, he will not diminish his love and admiration for the young man. After all, the last two lines say, human relationships cloud over from time to time just as the sky does. The implication here is that the clouds will eventually move on and the sun will shine again.
.......The word flatter in the second line could indicate that the poet–despite the forgiving attitude he mentions in Line 13–may be a bit peeved. In most dictionaries, one of the definitions for flattery is insincere praise. Thus, it could be that Shakespeare is chiding the young man for giving perfunctory, artificial praise, then returning to his “celestial orbit" and remaining there.
.......In the fifth line, basest clouds appears to refer to despicable persons or regrettable circumstances that estranged the two men.