In what bright realm, what sphere of radiant thought
Did Nature find the model whence she drew
That delicate dazzling image where we view
Here on this earth what she in heaven wrought?
What fountain-haunting nymph, what dryad, sought
In groves, such golden tresses ever threw
Upon the gust? What heart such virtues knew?—
Though her chief virtue with my death is fraught.
He looks in vain for heavenly beauty, he
Who never looked upon her perfect eyes,
The vivid blue orbs turning brilliantly –
He does not know how Love yields and denies;
He only knows, who knows how sweetly she
Can talk and laugh, the sweetness of her sighs.
1.) Yes, there are a multitude of metaphors in this beautiful sonnet, the one i have picked is “the vivid blue orbs”. As i have read the poem, i can infer from context that he (the protagonist) is talking about her( the subject of his love). Describing the eyes as “vivid blue orbs”,as peculiar as it may seem (to me), it is the description of her more subtle beauty.
2.) The meaning of the sonnet, is that you cannot judge love unless you know it
3.) the Volta occurs in the last two lines or the rhyming couplet. At that point the narrator shows the naïve nature of the said character by saying that he will only know her material beauty instead of her actual beauty.
She is a beauty
She is a catch, maybe
But I won’t know her
React!