In Raleigh’s poem, Nature tries to create the perfect lover at Love’s request. Having washed her hands in milk and forgotten to dry them, she uses snow and silk to mold a woman with eyes of light, soft skin, and a tempting mix of wit and wantonness. But this flawless creature hides a heart of stone, so Love is destined to die when she refuses to save him. That’s the tragic little allegory of the first three stanzas.
The mood darkens when the speaker turns on Time. Nature may despise it, but Time’s rusting hands carelessly turn all that milk, snow, and silk to dust. It dims her radiance, dries her wantonness, and in the end shuts every life’s story in the grave. The feeling is bitter and elegiac—a lament for how youth, beauty, and joy are inevitably worn away by an indifferent force.