As humans go through their lives, they see many things and people come and go. They see family members pass away, and they see flowers die with the seasons. But it is rare that we predict the coming and going of such things. That is exactly what John Keats did in his poem, "When I have Fears that I May Cease to Be". Keats, who died an early death at the age of 25, wrote of dying an early death and he was genuinely afraid of facing such a terrible fate. In "When I Have Fears that I May Cease to Be", John Keats effectively shows his purpose through his use of structure, metaphorical and symbolic language, and addressing his three-part philosophical concept of "Negative Capability".

Keats initially emphasizes his purpose by his structure usage. This sonnet has three quatrains and ends with a couplet. The quatrains follow a rhyme scheme of A-B-A-B and the final couplet follows an A-A pattern. When read, the rhyme scheme is prevalent, but it still does not make for a sing-a-long due to the enjambment and pauses caused by mid-sentence hyphens and commas. As all sonnets do, the first three quatrains in "When I Have Fears that I may Cease to Be" set up a situation or problem and t

Bate, Walter Jackson. Modern Critical Views: John Keats. New York:

Gale Research, 1998. Reproduced in Student Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale Group. October, 2001. http://www.galenet.com/servlet/SRC/

Clubbe, John, and Ernest J. Lovell, Jr.. English Romanticism: The

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Approximate Word count = 1859
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)