As "Sonnet 45" opens, the speaker states that his thoughts and desires are always with his faraway lover. Their "motion" is so "swift," he suggests, that they can instantly cross the distance that divides the couple. He compares these thoughts and desires to air and fire, respectively, establishing an extended metaphor that will continue throughout the poem.
This metaphor is rooted in the four elements—earth, water, air, and fire—that, according to pre-modern science, make up the natural world. (Remember, Shakespeare wrote this poem around the end of the 16th century.) Earth and water were traditionally described as heavy and slow, air and fire as light and swift. Each of the four elements was thought to have particular qualities, influencing people's health, personality, and behavior:
- Water was associated with steadiness and reflection;
- Earth was associated with seriousness, analysis, and caution;
- Air was associated with knowledge, imagination, hope, and inspiration—a fitting choice for the speaker's "thought";
- And fire, representing the speaker's "desire," was associated with vitality, energy, and passion.
Strange as it may seem today, some system involving these elements was the foundation of much of the world's science and medicine from ancient times until the Victorian era. By referencing a widely known "scientific" principle, Shakespeare's metaphor helps readers understand the speaker's emotional problem from an intellectual perspective.
The speaker also draws out the individual qualities of the elements, so that they almost become characters in their own right: fire is purifying ("purging"), while air is lightweight and sprightly ("slight"). This effect makes the speaker's chaotic mood swings seem more vivid and dramatic.
It's clear that the speaker has already discussed the heavy elements, as he calls air and fire "The other two." In fact, this phrase alludes to the poem that comes right before "Sonnet 45" in Shakespeare's larger sonnet sequence. "Sonnet 44" provides more details and context for the element metaphor:
- This poem describes the speaker's devastation that he isn't made entirely of "thought," which travels so quickly toward his beloved that "injurious distance" wouldn't keep them apart.
- Instead, he's largely made up of "slow" elements (earth and water), which the speaker describes in a negative light—as barriers to overcome ("nimble thought can jump both sea and land") and expressions of pain ("heavy tears").
The reference to the previous sonnet indicates that this poem builds on its themes: the speaker's preference for the lighter elements, the pain of his lover's absence, and the sadness that the heavy elements cause. Therefore, when the audience learns that "the other two" elements are always away from the speaker, this allusion immediately suggests an atmosphere of sorrow and longing.
This passage features both juxtaposition and paradox. First, the speaker's thoughts and desires (represented by air and fire) "are both with thee, wherever I abide." That is, the speaker is in one place and his lover is somewhere far away, yet, in a seeming paradox, elements of the speaker are actually with his lover. Similarly, the speaker describes his thoughts and desires as "present-absent," again juxtaposing their two locations: present (with the speaker) and absent (with the lover). "Present-absent" can also be read as an oxymoron, because it seemingly contradicts itself: the elements are present and absent at the same time. Perhaps they move so quickly that it's hard for the speaker to tell where exactly his thoughts and desires really are. Or perhaps the lack of these elements always looms over the speaker; their absence is ever-present in his mind.
The phrase "present-absent" probably alludes to Sir Philip Sidney's "Sonnet 106" (from his Astrophil and Stella sequence), in which Astrophil, the speaker of Sidney's sonnet, laments the "absent presence" of his beloved, Stella. This allusion reinforces the atmosphere of romance and high drama in Shakespeare's poem.
By the second line of "Sonnet 45," it's clear that the speaker is directly addressing his lover ("thee"), who cannot respond. This kind of address to an absent person is called apostrophe. By allowing the speaker to address the source of his passions, it heightens the poem's tension and emotional impact. Plus, the second-person point of view creates the illusion that the speaker is communicating directly with readers—an effect that encourages reader sympathy.
These opening lines establish the poem's iambic pentameter, meaning that there are five unstressed and five stressed syllables per line in a da-DUM da-DUM pattern. The meter throughout the first several lines is nearly "perfect"; it doesn't deviate from the standard iambic pentameter pattern at all, except that there's an extra emphasis on "slight." All of these lines are also end-stopped, with the regular pauses at the end of each line reinforcing the regularity of the meter. The first three lines even feature a caesura after the fourth syllable, creating yet another regular pause and further establishing the rhythm:
The other two, || slight air and purging fire,
Are both with thee, || wherever I abide;
The first my thought, || the other my desire,
The absence of caesurae (pauses) in line 7 helps the meter gain momentum, reflecting the "swift motion" that this line describes. Other sound devices in this line also evoke this speedy motion. In particular, assonant short vowel sounds (/eh/ and /ih/) quicken the pace of the verse, while sibilant /z/ and /s/ sounds create a swift, zipping sound:
These present-absent with swift motion slide.