Sonnet 153
Cupid laid by his brand, and fell asleep:
love
fire
Cupid
desire
Cupid laid by his brand, and fell asleep:
A maid of Dian's this advantage found,
And his love-kindling fire did quickly steep
In a cold valley-fountain of that ground;
Which borrow'd from this holy fire of Love
A dateless lively heat, still to endure,
And grew a seething bath, which yet men prove
Against strange maladies a sovereign cure.
But at my mistress' eye Love's brand new-fired,
The boy for trial needs would touch my breast;
I, sick withal, the help of bath desired,
And thither hied, a sad distemper'd guest,
But found no cure: the bath for my help lies
Where Cupid got new fire--my mistress' eyes.
What It Means
A Cupid myth: a nymph took Cupid's torch and quenched it in a cool well, but the well heated up instead — love's fire is too powerful to be extinguished by cold water. The hot well became a bath. Shakespeare went there seeking a cure for the fever of desire and found only more heat. His mistress is the only cure.
Context
The first of the two closing sonnets (153–154), which are classical epigrams derived from a poem by the Greek epigrammatist Marianus. They stand apart from the main sequences stylistically.
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