The speaker stages a firm, almost theatrical breakup. He calls for a final kiss, insists he’s truly glad to be free, and wants a clean, complete separation. They’ll shake hands, cancel every vow, and when they cross paths later, no trace of former love should show on their faces. His words sound resolute, even triumphant, as if he’s proving to himself that he can walk away unscathed. But in the closing couplet, the mask slips. He imagines Love on its deathbed — Passion speechless, Faith and Innocence gathered round — and suddenly admits that even at this last moment, the beloved could revive everything with a single wish. The confident dismissal hides a desperate hope. The mood shifts sharply from defiant finality to raw, exposed longing, leaving us with the ache of someone who protests too much.
Sonnet LXI: Since There's No Help — Summary
Since there's no help, come, let us kiss and part, Nay, I have done, you get no more of me, And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart, That thus so cleanly I myself can free. Shake hands for ever, cancel all our vows, And when we meet at any time again Be it not seen in either of our brows That we one jot of former love retain. Now at the last gasp of Love's latest breath, When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies, When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death, And Innocence is closing up his eyes, Now, if thou wouldst, when all have giv'n him over, From death to life thou might'st him yet recover.