Shakespeare's and Howard Moss: Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Compare And Contrast

Introduction

In this essay, I would like to analyze two poems that have the same titles. One is "Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer's Day?" written by William Shakespeare. The other also has the same title, "Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer's Day?" written by Howard Moss. In fact, the two poems have not only the same titles but also similar stories. In other words, Moss's poem is a parody of Shakespeare's poem. By the way, how are they different and also similar?

The First Impression of Two Poems

When I first read both Shakespeare's poem and Moss's poem, I could not understand Shakespeare's thought. What I feel about his poem is that it seems to be very unusual while Moss's poem looks very natural. I mean that it is hard to read rather than hard to understand because there are some old English words. For example, Shakespeare states,

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? -1st line

Thou art more lovely and more temperate -2nd line

And summer's lease hath all too short a date -4th line

He used 'thee' and 'thou' instead of 'you' and 'your'. He did not use 'have' but used 'hath'. I feel old English styles of the 16th century through his poem.

A Figure of speech

One of the other reasons that make this poem unusual is that it includes many figures of speech. A figure of speech is an expression or use of language to achieve a particular effect. Figures of speech also include metaphors and similes. There are some metaphors in Shakespeare's poem while Moss's poem is made up of very typical sentences. I think that 'summer's day' in Shakespeare's poem includes lots of meaning. He mentions the day like the paragraph 1. Moss also states,

Who ...