If Thou Must Love Me, Let It Be For Nought (Sonnet 14) Literary Elements

A woman speaking to a second-person listener about the nature of their love for each other,

Italian sonnet with an ABBA ABBA CDCDCD rhyme scheme, written in iambic pentameter.

The description of "a trick of thought/That falls in well with mine" uses falling as a metaphor for emotional and mental convergence.

Alliterative L sounds are something of a constant in this poem. Both Th and L sounds appear alliteratively in the line “Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!" Alliterative L's also appear in the opening line "If thou must love me, let it be for nought" and in the line "But love me for love's sake, that evermore." The short E sounds of the line "A sense of pleasant ease on such a day" create assonance, as do the long I and Y sounds in "Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry."

The poem is built around the attempt to negate an ironic fact about love: that it is is idealized as everlasting, though it takes place between individuals who are constantly changing.

Italian Sonnet

Highly ambiguous, though Browning writes in the context of Victorian England

Assertive; Pensive

Protagonist: The unnamed speaker addressing her lover. Antagonist: Impermanence and other factors that threaten lasting love

The speaker's desire to be loved in a lasting, pure way despite various threats to such a love.

The climax occurs when the speaker stresses that even a love forged in genuine sympathy will dissolve when the desire for comfort fades.

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The speaker understates the importance of intellectual connection by calling it a “trick of thought.”

The poem loosely alludes to Victorian ideals of love and romance.

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The speaker subtly personifies love as an entity with character and human qualities.

The speaker hyperbolically asks for an undying, eternal love.

"Weep” is an instance of onomatopoeia.