The speaker’s Muses sit weeping around him, their tears drawn by the sorrowful lines he writes. He has tried to immortalize the woman he loves in poetry, building “strong-built trophies” to her name, but she disdains his verses. So he decides to stop: his heart will become the tomb where her name is buried, hidden from the world. No more public praise—only silent, inward mourning.
He asks the walls to soften with his tears, since she is deaf to his moans. Like Orpheus, who sang to trees and stones after losing Eurydice, he now sings to things that cannot feel—and they at least seem moved with pity. The irony cuts deep: even unfeeling nature appears kinder than the woman he loved so long. The mood is one of wounded retreat, a man wrapping his grief around himself because the one who should care simply does not.