The speaker tells his beloved that it’s fine if she reads other poets’ praises—she was never “married” to his own artistic inspiration. He admits her beauty and intelligence far outstrip anything he could say, so she naturally looks for fresher, more fashionable tributes. He even encourages it. But he plants a quiet challenge: once those writers have twisted language into the most elaborate flattery they can manage, they still won’t match what he offers. His “true plain words” capture her real fairness more faithfully than their rhetorical excess. The mood is confident, a little wry, and deeply affectionate. There’s no desperate jealousy here, just a lover who believes sincerity beats artifice. He closes by suggesting that overblown praise belongs on faces that need rouge—on her, such “painting” is pointless and misapplied.
Sonnet 82: I grant thou wert not married to my Muse — Summary
I grant thou wert not married to my Muse, And therefore mayst without attaint o'erlook The dedicated words which writers use Of their fair subject, blessing every book. Thou art as fair in knowledge as in hue, Finding thy worth a limit past my praise; And therefore art enforced to seek anew Some fresher stamp of the time-bettering days. And do so, love; yet when they have devis'd, What strained touches rhetoric can lend, Thou truly fair, wert truly sympathiz'd In true plain words, by thy true-telling friend; And their gross painting might be better us'd Where cheeks need blood; in thee it is abus'd.