The poem that I chose to blog about is "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd." Obviously by the title, we know that the narrator is the nymph and this poem is her reply to the shepherd. There are a few themes throughout the poem. First, nature is a theme that reminds us that death is all around us. Raleigh refers to flowers fading which further proves his point that death is all around us. Another theme is time. The author refers to seasonal changes multiple times in the poem to further prove his point that we only have so much time. When the nymph refers to young lasting, she realizes that you only have a certain amount of time and you aren't young forever.
This poem is organized into six quatrains for a total of twenty-four lines. Raleigh's use of alliteration really jumped out at me in this poem. He refers to flowers fading, rivers raging, corals clasping. I think Raleigh is just trying to get his reader's attention in order to get his point across. There is also some personification involved by bringing something inanimate to life like rocks and rivers. He says that rivers rage and rocks grow cold.
Starting in the fourth quatrain, Raleigh begins to repeat the word "thy." I think his purpose for doing this to just get his point across and grab the reader's attention. Her response in the end is basically that she would be with the Shepherd if youth lasted, joy had no date, and age had no need. She is trying to tell him that if they could be forever young, could always be happy, and age didn't matter, she would be with the shepherd. Because it is very hard and realistic for all these things to happen, the nymph's response to being with the shepherd is sadly no.