Sonnet 147 written by Shakespeare is written to explain how profoundly in love he is with this contraversial black lady. It is composed of fourteen lines, three quatrains and a single couplet. Throughout the poem Shakespeare seems to be very upset that he is in love despite having every reason not to be, he explains in the second quatrain. With all this emotion, he admits that he is insane in the final quatrain, acting like a madman. The final couplet says that the he believes she is beautiful and perfect but in all actuality is dark and evil.
The first quatrain talks about his disease called love. Shakespeare called his love a fever, longing still. His love is a fever, a sickness that symptoms is high temperature. The love keeps him sick but yet makes him hot with emotion. The second line in this quatrain uses ambiguity in the word longer. Its dual meaning here is that the disease has and will continue in a prolonged amount of time and its opposite meaning is to long for or desire the feeling of love. The feeling in line three preserves itself by continuing its sickness. The final line emphisizes the fact that he feeds on his love, even when its evils are uncovered.
The second quatrain Shakespeare admits that he should not be in love despite having reason not to be. This quatrain seems to focus that his lover is a physician, using many refrences to a doctor. The second line states that Shakespeare's love was not returned, the love is described through the word prescription and aren't kept. A possible reason is maybe this women was unfaithful or maybe his love was not wanted. The final two lines describe without the love, that he is desperate and wants nothing but love or death. This ties in with the whole physician idea, the prescription (the love) from the physician (the black lady) is the only cure for such a disease.
The final quatrain discusses that it has turned him into a mad man.