The poem can be found here: http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/130.html

Through, “Sonnet 130,” Shakespeare fabricates a lyric poem about his mistress and his love for her in the most unexpected way by drawing upon her unattractiveness. Like usual, Shakespeare again excels at his own type of sonnet: Shakespearian Sonnet with the form of iambic pentameter. The use of this rhythm is commonly used by Shakespeare to achieve a certain flow of how the poem is read by the reader. This is often the distinguishing feature of Shakespeare’s writing through the plethora of iambic pentameter, he used throughout his works. More specifically for,” Sonnet 130,” Shakespeare uses an abundance of metaphors and similes to elicit the image of his mistress while mocking the conventions of beauty in his era. While other poets of his era compare their lovers to idealized images of beauty, Shakespeare on the other hand tells the truth, ” [her] eyes are nothing like the sun.” He seems to say,” Oh you’re mistress’ eyes are like the sun, well my mistress’ eyes are certainly not!” He uses these cliche comparisons in the negative form to really bring to light how funny the metaphors that emphasize beauty are. Trite but true, beauty is within the eyes of the beholder which is the second message that Shakespeare touches upon. This poem questions the legitimacy of society’s boundaries of what the definition of beauty is or encompasses. By telling the truth that his mistress is definitely not the fairest by society’s standards, he displays the significance of his love for her. For he ignores the ephemeral things like fleeting beauty or appearance and accepts her for who she is on the inside. All in all, the poem is again wonderfully written and does Shakespeare justice. This sonnet is famous for it’s satire, but even through the satire, a deeper tone of seriousness is able to be explored from the underlying themes of true beauty and love. This was seen through the structure of the poem, which was well thought out. The beginning of the sonnet contains truncated comparisons but are stretched out in the middle of the sonnet, and then finishing with a bit of a plot twist. This structure keeps the reader intrigued and leads to an ending that was definitely not expected.