An Explication of William Blake's The Sick Rose

The Sick Rose by William Blake is a very influential poem about love and beauty, lust and corruption. The poem is about an innocent woman losing something very precious to her, her virginity, to a very unfaithful and deceitful man. The message that the author is conveying is that the actions of one person can affect another individual more than the perpetrator can know.

The rose is the first symbol in the poem. Roses are associated with love and beauty because they have life and love. The use of the rose allows the reader to draw good emotions out of the poem. The rose also represents the positive connotation of the poem. The rose mentioned in the poem can be classified as a person. This personification can be seen in the lines ."..Thou art sick / ...Thy...