When I Consider How My Light Is Spent by John Milton

“When I Consider How My Light Is Spent” By John Milton

John Milton engages in a rhyme pattern and uses Biblical references with verbalism of archaic language that brilliantly completes this Petrarchan sonnet. The elements of meter, rhythm, and rhyme are consecutively parallel with the element of foundation. As a Petrarchan sonnet, the meter is iambic pentameter that guides itself to the definite rhythm this poem consists of. The rhyme pattern that Milton portrays is in the form of ABBAABBACDECDE, with the octet rhyming separately from the sestet. All of these elements collaborate reflecting in the octet and how �the one, who took away his light,’ now expects labor from him. In the sestet, Milton illustrates the Lord's generous response to his servant. The one structural difference lies in the division of the octet from the sestet, because the speaker changes here as well, making this poem exceptional in the dynamic of announcer and audience.

The aspect of this poem is its articulation, and this is the most important element because it is not only what makes up the poem, but also the lessons help the reader to disentangle what makes up the poem and the lessons and true meaning. Many are persuaded to believe that the speaker was Milton himself; he lost his eyesight curtly before this poem premiered. The first row of Milton's work places the foundation for the poem to develop and also formulates the mood for this sonnet. The first eight lines are being illustrated by the one who elevates the dilemma of all doubts, which clouds his faith. The speaker's reflection at this time exposes his stupefaction and basis for the poem, and also tells the reader that this poem shows in depth examples of his uncertainty. Following these lines, the audience from the octet develops the speaker of the sestet, which attempts to thoughtfully give the skeptical man peace. There is not a mass amount of illustrative language in this work, the symbolic tongue that it has is very strong. In line three, the design that hiding one's talent brings about death is a tough association to assume, and it exhibits the commentator’s emotions in this tale.

Another facet rampant in this work is the several Biblical and religious references established. Milton refers to the fable of the Talents in Matthew, in which the man of the story was released to the darkness; the light power of vision is removed. The speaker directs his question to God, as he recognizes that it was God who provides him his abilities originally, and declares him his maker. There is the position presumably God, since he refers to the mild yoke that Jesus speaks of in Matthew 11 when he says that "my yoke is easy and my burden is light." As the second line begins with the archaic narrowing, "Ere," the reader is directed to acknowledge that the writing of this poem takes place long ago and that the gist of some words was without a doubt dissimilar then. Knowing that John Milton probably lost his eyesight shortly before he wrote this poem is very momentous, because the second line he refers to darkness, and because of the substance of the speaker's question, the significance of this remark could suggest his spiritual darkness, as of the question that is trailed, or the physically dark world the writer had begun to live in.

The talent that he deems that