"That Time of Year" by William Shakespeare

In William Shakespeare’s poem, “That Time of Year,” three major images are introduced through the three quatrains in the poem. These images are the comparison age to the fading of autumn, the fading of the twilight, and the fading of a fire. Each of these images also further represents death or upcoming death. Stated in the first quatrain, “when yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang,” (Shakespeare, 966) this quote represents the little life left in a person close to death. When one is nearing his end, there are few leaves left within him to keep him going. Furthermore, the empty, bare boughs described in the poem represent the little fight left within a person before death. The second quatrain focuses on the fading of the twilight as comparison to death. Death is commonly associated with the lights going out, and the disappearance of any light left from twilight represents a life extinguished. The sunset is slowly diminished by the darkness of the night, just as life is diminished by the darkness of death. The fading of the fire described in the third quatrain further extends this analogy. The only thing keeping the narrator alive are the “ashes of his youth,” and in the end, these ashes lead to the death just as eventually life leads to death.