I sometimes hear poets and non-poets disparage sonnets, calling them outdated and contrived, too formulaic. They speak of the form and the rhyme schemes as restrictive. But I like good sonnets, and I’m particularly fond of Shakespeare’s sonnets. To do a sonnet well, is to master meter, rhyme, and language. By my way of thinking Shakespeare’s greatest sonnets are a form of freedom inside of a container.

As Dame Judi Dench reads this sonnet, she will steal your breath away and strum the strings of your heart.

Happy Valentine’s Day to all the world’s friends and lovers!

[To hear Dench read this sonnet on YouTube, click here. Start the clip at 1:10.]

Sonnet 29

When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,

I all alone beweep my outcast state,

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,

And look upon myself and curse my fate,

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,

Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,

With what I most enjoy contented least;

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,

Haply I think on thee, and then my state,

(Like to the lark at break of day arising

From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;

       For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings

       That then I scorn to change my state with kings.