© Sonnet 98 Botanical Perfume Inspired by Shakespeare
I go through thousands of cycles: I am reborn every time I realise the essentials of life, watch sunrise, follow the tides, observe moon phases and await a change of seasons.
Literally a “little song,” the sonnet traditionally reflects upon a single sentiment, with a clarification or “turn” of thought in its concluding lines.
- Poetry Foundation
Life is a Sonnet. Addressing transient human life cycles, Sonnet 98 stands at the birth of those: be it early spring or the beginning of a day, there is always a circle where every being is born and reborn. Smell the early notes of sweet basil, sage, thyme, earthy vetiver and olibanum, and a hint of rosy blossoms of geranium mingled with may chang.
While sonnets are usually love songs in a poetical form, a sonnet by Shakespeare numbered 98 is about spring and love. Translating verse into scent always goes through some personal perceptions and even every reader tends to re-interpret poetry and fiction using his experiences, senses and imagination.
Sonnet 98 eau de parfum is indeed a song, a song for spring and renewal. But how important are seasons when we talk about changes in our soul? We do not fall in love every spring, it is so spontaneous and natural, that seasons do not matter at all. Sonnet is a reflection on time, its slow and fast currents, the essential and trivial events happening but most importantly it is about the desires arising at certain moments of our life. Contemplating on natural and human life cycles, we come to conclusions that we all depend on nature, we repeat the birth and death, we undergo changes but as the nature adjusts to its own environment, so must we.
Sonnet 98: From you have I been absent in the spring
By W. Shakespeare
From you have I been absent in the spring,
When proud-pied April, dressed in all his trim,
Hath put a spirit of youth in everything,
That heavy Saturn laughed and leaped with him.
Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell
Of different flowers in odour and in hue,
Could make me any summer’s story tell,
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew:
Nor did I wonder at the lily’s white,
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose;
They were but sweet, but figures of delight
Drawn after you, – you pattern of all those.
Yet seem’d it winter still, and, you away,
As with your shadow I with these did play.
“Sonnet 98 is one of the many sonnets which Shakespeare addressed to the ‘Fair Youth’, an important lover or friend. The identity of the man who inspired Shakespeare so, as well as the nature of the relationship between the two, has long been discussed and debated, with the mystery ultimately remaining unsolved.
Dealing with the theme of separation, in Sonnet 98, Shakespeare laments the lack of joy to be found in the beauty of spring, as it pales in comparison to the beauty of his absent companion.” - The Reader
The notes chosen for the perfume reflect the bare soil and the first sprigs of herbs: sage, basil, thyme intertwine with powdery ginger and green cypress, with a hint of light rose notes of geranium Bourbon and grounding vetiver and olibanum. There are no seasons for perfumes, as well as there is no gender for botanical accords. It is about a constant revival within us we have to think about. Whether it takes place once a year or every day, we must not forget it is part of existence. It is only when we bend down to the earth we see the genesis of all things alive including our consciousness. Why not blend this into a liquid verse, fed by the sun and air, grown and harvested, distilled and made into perfume:
“Its tight rhyme scheme and metrical regularity emphasize its musicality, but the sonnet is also thought of as the first poetic form that was intended to be read silently, as opposed to performed and shared: it is “the first lyric of self-consciousness, or of the self in conflict,” according to Paul Oppenheimer in The Birth of the Modern Mind: Self, Consciousness, and the Invention of the Sonnet (1989). As such, the form consists of two parts, often called the proposition and resolution. Dividing them is the volta, or turn. Thus, a problem or question is often presented in the first section of a sonnet and then, via the pivot made by the turn, resolved or given new perspective in the second.“ - Rachel Richardson, Poetry Foundation.
Sonnet 98 is a fusion as all of our perfumes, in this case it is a poem, a scent, a study of ones’s love, loss and yourself. What is Sonnet 98 for you?
To learn more about sonnets and sonneteers, we recommend a series of books by Everyman’s Library:
Love Songs and Sonnets
Selected by Peter Washington
Sonnets: From Dante to Present
Selected by John Hollander
William Shakespeare
The Sonnets and Narrative Poems
Introduction by Helen Vendler