Here is sonnet no. 65. I'm going to (a) space this out and (b) add a running comment that might be helpful in suggesting the kinds of reactions one might have when reading it. Let me know if this helps. Since brass, neither stone, nor earth, nor sea without limits "ni" = "and not". A list. . . a slow-paced list. What kind of things? what scope? what do they have in common?. . . The sentence has only just begun. . .But sad mortality dominates their power, Ah. . . none of them last. And yet they seem strong and durable. Is it true what he says? And anyway, so what? why mention this? The sentence has not yet reached its main clause. . .How, with this rage, can beauty plead, Aha: here is the point: the sad pathetic vulnerability of “beauty”. Very general though. Is he talking about a particular beauty? “Taking a plea” is good: a kind of legal image, right? Whose action is no stronger than a flower? Beauty has little to stand against time. “Action” seems to continue the legal metaphor. The image becomes more particular – “a flower” – even if it remains relatively general. We are more aware of the tone of the speaker lamenting, less of the particular things he names. . . Poor pathetic beauty. . . The sentence is finished. Oh, how will the honeyed breath of summer withstand the dreadful siege of the days of blows, New beginning: new phrase. I repeat, more intensely. It's getting better, it's more precise. Beautiful sensual and fresh appeal in "honey breath". Summer is a nice-smelling person, probably a beloved person (you would hardly want to smell someone else's sweet breath). His breath is having trouble “holding out”: you wonder what that means? Last long enough? A singer who sustains a long note or a long phrase needs a breath that "holds up." And "to resist a siege" means to resist a siege: this is why summer turned into a fortress or a besieged city. And the besieging enemy uses battering rams and tries to destroy everything. Imagery: Note that we do not fully visualize summer as a person; it’s a delicate suggestion that slips into the next image, that of the besieged city. And we don't think of summer as a city either. In fact, “visualize” is too crude a term to describe what this subtle imagery does...