The Second-Best Bed

The second-best bed symbolizes union. The goal of the poem is to upend the commonly-held interpretation that Shakespeare gifted his wife his second-best bed in his will as a slight. Instead, in "Anne Hathaway," the second-best bed is the bed that Hathaway and Shakespeare shared, where they expressed their love for one another in a way the speaker will always cherish. Thus, by the end of the poem, the speaker is happy to receive the second-best bed, as it is actually more than simply a bed for either one of them.

Poetry

Poetry symbolizes love. Throughout the poem, the speaker compares the bed, as well as her and her lover, to different elements of poetry. She says she is "a softer rhyme" than her husband, while his touch is "a verb dancing in the centre of a noun" (5-7). These comparisons between bodies and...