Like to the lark

 Sonnet XXIX

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 myself like 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,

I haply 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.

Lines 5-6 one, him, him i.e. various different people.

Line 7 scope. OED gives the modern sense of mental range or reach (6a), but this is much earlier than its other examples. More likely 2d: level of skill, excellence.

Line 8 enjoy. I.e. possess. Referring rather to his talents than his job or family.

I'm sure I've mentioned before that I once learnt the first fifty sonnets by heart; I used to declaim them to myself while on a long daily commute to Bristol (on the days I wasn't lift-sharing). It was a wonderful way of getting under a poem's skin, and I've had a special fondness for these early sonnets ever since.

I used to look forward to reaching this one in my recitation, a moment when the sequence, like the lark, attains a new height of devout ecstasy, a height sustained through XXX and XXXI. Love is never quite so purely perfect again. I was going to say "so simple", but that's a moot point. 

The pace of the poem gains, through that second quatrain, the doubts of a self-made man, and then the third, the fluttering rise of the.lark. And then, in the final couplet (and unlike a lark), the pace changes, the poem soars on those long syllables of "thy sweet love".

Another thing I appreciated from repeatedly reciting these poems was their capaciousness, the range of emotions they can express. On one reading I might feel the resurgence of humble gratitude that follows a period of discontent. On another, the lark's ascent can proclaim not humility but fierce pride. Or that soaring phrase "thy sweet love remembered" could evoke grief for a loss, though that's not what Shakespeare intended: "remembered" here just means "brought back to mind". Or on another day, this same phrase could be about fondly dwelling on erotic details.

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I was reminded of this sonnet while reading the liner notes to Like to the Lark, a recent CD by the Swedish Chamber Choir with Simon Phipps, a fascinating assemblage of mainly British and Nordic choral pieces, including RVW's Lark Ascending with the solo violin backed by chorus rather than orchestra.

https://www.chandos.net/products/catalogue/CHAN%205255

Out here in remote places a CD liner note can feel quite inspiring. The Stenhammar selection has texts by Jens Peter Jacobsen, a Danish author I didn't know and am now avid to read more of.

These notes on Shakespeare: Full List