The speaker begs the beloved to turn against him immediately — to join forces with the misfortune already crushing him. He doesn’t want a delayed, after-the-fact blow. A windy night followed by a rainy morning captures his dread of drawn-out suffering: a sharp, sudden defeat would be easier to endure. If the beloved is going to leave, he pleads, let it happen now, while other sorrows are still raw. Then the full calamity of loss will arrive so abruptly that every later grief will seem almost gentle. Once he has tasted the very worst fortune can do, he argues, all other pains will feel trivial by comparison. The mood is urgent and aching, a lover so desperate to avoid slow heartbreak that he requests hatred as a form of mercy.
Sonnet 90: Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now — Summary
Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now; Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross, Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow, And do not drop in for an after-loss: Ah! do not, when my heart hath 'scap'd this sorrow, Come in the rearward of a conquer'd woe; Give not a windy night a rainy morrow, To linger out a purpos'd overthrow. If thou wilt leave me, do not leave me last, When other petty griefs have done their spite, But in the onset come: so shall I taste At first the very worst of fortune's might; And other strains of woe, which now seem woe, Compar'd with loss of thee, will not seem so.