Point of View

This poem is written in first-person present-tense point of view. The use of this perspective situates the speaker firmly in the middle of the poem’s events, which is suitable for a poem that is intended to express an emotional experience rather than to share a narrative. The first-person present-tense perspective helps increase the reader’s access to the feelings the speaker is portraying.

Yet this choice is more than just making use of a poetic convention. It is also one of Wyatt’s most significant translational choices. Petrarch also wrote the original poem in the first person present tense, but in Italian, the “I” pronoun usually disappears. Thus, the speaker’s perspective is less obvious. Wyatt also introduces more uses of the personal pronoun than is grammatically necessary, even in English where it is more often called for. In doing so, he provides frequent...