Sonnet 15 claims that everything that grows holds its perfection for only a moment, and then, for the first time in the sequence, the speaker offers his own answer to time: as Time takes from the young man, the poet will graft him new in verse.
Sonnet 15: Full Poem
When I consider every thing that grows
Holds in perfection but a little moment,
That this huge stage presenteth naught but shows
Whereon the stars in secret influence comment;
When I perceive that men as plants increase,
Cheered and checked even by the selfsame sky,
Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease,
And wear their brave state out of memory;
Then the conceit of this inconstant stay
Sets you most rich in youth before my sight,
Where wasteful Time debateth with Decay
To change your day of youth to sullied night;
And all in war with Time for love of you,
As he takes from you, I engraft you new.
Text from the 1609 Quarto, with spelling and punctuation lightly modernized.
At a Glance
Here are the key facts about Sonnet 15 for quick reference.
What Sonnet 15 Means
Sonnet 15 surveys everything that lives and dies, then answers in a new way.
The first quatrain looks at the whole world. When the speaker considers that every growing thing stays perfect for only a brief moment, and that this huge stage of the world presents nothing but shows, on which the stars comment by their secret influence.
The second quatrain narrows to people. When he sees that men grow like plants, encouraged and held back by the same sky, boast in the sap of youth, begin to decline at their height, and wear out their splendor until it is forgotten.
The third quatrain turns to the young man. Then the thought of how brief life is sets him before the speaker’s eyes at his richest, while wasteful Time argues with Decay over how to turn his bright day of youth into dirty night.
The couplet declares war. For love of the young man, the speaker fights Time: as Time takes from him, the speaker grafts him new, renewing him in verse.
Sonnet 15 Line by Line
Each line, with the sense of it in plain English.
Themes
Sonnet 15 is the turning point of the Procreation Sonnets, and its themes carry the sequence from children to poetry.
Everything That Grows Declines
The opening lines state the rule without exception: “every thing that grows / Holds in perfection but a little moment.” Plants and people rise, peak, and fall under the same sky. The survey echoes Sonnet 12, but reaches wider, from a garden to the whole world.
Life as a Stage
“This huge stage presenteth naught but shows” pictures the world as a theater and every life as a brief performance, with the stars as critics in the audience. Shakespeare returns to the idea often, most famously in “All the world’s a stage” from As You Like It.
Verse as a Graft
For fourteen sonnets, the answer to time has been a child. Sonnet 15 does not mention children at all. Instead the speaker steps in himself: “I engraft you new.” It is the first time the sequence claims that poetry can preserve the young man, the idea that will become central to Sonnet 18 and Sonnet 19.
Form and Language
Sonnet 15 is built as one long sentence that moves from the whole world to one person, and it ends on a single, crucial verb.
Meter and Rhyme
The poem is a Shakespearean sonnet in iambic pentameter, rhyming ABAB CDCD EFEF GG. Line 2 ends on an extra unstressed syllable, “moment,” and its rhyme, “comment,” has one too, so the first quatrain lingers on the very idea of a brief moment.
“When … When … Then”
Like Sonnet 12, the poem opens with “When I consider” and “When I perceive,” building a case before “Then” turns it toward the young man. The grammar carries the reader from the universe to the garden to one face.
Time and Decay in Debate
Line 11 makes Time and Decay into two figures arguing over the young man’s future, like lawyers or councilors deciding how best to ruin him. The personification turns aging from a natural process into a plan, which makes the speaker’s counterattack feel like a real fight.
“Engraft”
To engraft is to join a fresh shoot to a living plant so that it grows again. The word completes the plant imagery of the second quatrain. Many readers also hear in it the Greek root for writing, as in words like “graphic,” so that grafting the young man new also suggests writing him new.
A Closer Reading
Sonnet 15 shows where the young man is preserved before a single line about him is written: in the speaker’s mind.
Follow the verbs. The poem begins with “When I consider,” then “When I perceive,” then “the conceit,” then “before my sight.” It moves from thinking about the world, to watching it, to a single mental image. “Conceit” meant a thought or idea, and also the kind of elaborate image poets make. In line 10, that conceit “Sets you most rich in youth before my sight.” The young man is not in front of the speaker. He is held there, at his richest, by the speaker’s imagination.
That is the first step of the graft. Time and Decay are working on the real young man, arguing over how to darken his day. But the young man in the speaker’s mind is not aging; the conceit has fixed him at the peak of his youth. The couplet only makes public what the third quatrain has already done in private: “As he takes from you, I engraft you new.”
So Sonnet 15 quietly explains how poetry can do what children do. A child carries the father’s body forward. A poem carries forward the image in someone’s mind, the “conceit” that saw him at his best. From here on, the sequence will trust that second kind of inheritance more and more, until, in Sonnet 18, it needs nothing else.
Common Questions
The questions readers ask most often about Sonnet 15, answered briefly.
Who Is Sonnet 15 Addressed To?
The young man of the Fair Youth sonnets, though he is not addressed until the third quatrain.
What Does “I Engraft You New” Mean?
I renew you, as a gardener grafts a fresh shoot onto a plant. As Time takes the young man’s youth away, the speaker restores it in his poetry.
What Does “This Huge Stage Presenteth Naught but Shows” Mean?
The world is a great theater that offers nothing but brief performances. Every life is a show that ends, while the stars look on and comment.
What Is the Stars’ “Secret Influence”?
The hidden power the stars were thought to have over events on earth, as in astrology. The speaker imagines them commenting on the world’s performances, like an audience.
How Is Sonnet 15 Different from the Earlier Procreation Sonnets?
It never mentions children. Instead of urging the young man to have a son, the speaker promises to preserve him in verse. Sonnet 16 immediately answers with a “But,” returning to the case for children.
Related Sonnets
Three sonnets frame Sonnet 15’s turn from children to verse.