What Queen Elizabeth attempted to express in On Monsieurs Departure is that whenever some event happens, the opposite of what she is expecting occurs. Elizabeth is unable to express her true feelings and opinions about a man. The poem is about a relationship with a man and how Elizabeth is unable to talk with him. “His too familiar care doth make me rue it” (Line 10) is a clear example that shows this forbidden love.
When I was Fair and Young is a poem about past love. Queen Elizabeth reminisces about an old lover she had feelings towards. She came to the conclusion that her love for her past significant other no longer exists and there is nothing she can do about this situation. Venus's son helps Elizabeth deals with her sadness, and claims “I will so pluck your plumes that you shall say no more” (Line 11). After this experience with Venus’s son, her attitude is changed and no longer mopes about what could have been.
The poet of To Plead My Faith Where Faith Had No Reward expresses how he has been hurt because of unrequited love. The woman’s actions in the poem tore them apart, and he says “Forget my name, since you have scorned my love” (Line 9).
What is Our Life talks about how life is one enormous spectacle, “The earth is the stage, Heaven the spectator” (line 5). The poem is essentially saying that a superior being is just observing us for entertainment.
The Death of Raleigh provides an overview of Raliegh’s death. The poem describes that “A scaffold was erected in the Old Palace yard, upon which after 14 years of reprivement head was cut off” (Line 1-3). Raliegh died a horrid death on the scaffold.
