“But thy eternal summer shall not fade.”-Who is the poet? What is meant by thy eternal summer’? How does the poet suggest that ‘thy eternal summer shall never end?

The poet is William Shakespeare. The phrase ‘eternal summer’ refers to the everlasting beauty of the poet’s friend. ‘Eternal summer’ means timeless beauty. The poet’s friend is lovelier and more temperate than the summer’s day, free from the decline of the ‘fair’ things and his beauty is beyond the power of death.

In this mortal world, every lovely natural object is vulnerable to decay or change that is inevitable. But the poet’s friend’s beauty is imperishable. The cold, cruel touch of death is unable to claim his beauty and drag him down to the dark, lifeless realm. The poet’s friend’s ‘eternal summer shall never fade. He will, in fact, live and thrive through Shakespeare’s verse. The beauty of the poet’s friend will never diminish as he would preserve his friend’s beauty in the perpetual lines of his poem and this is the conclusion that the poet draws at the end of the poem.

“Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade, / When in eternal lines to time thou grow’ st,”—Who is the poet? Who is the ‘thou’ here? What shall death not be able to brag about and why?

The poet is William Shakespeare. 

Here the ‘thou’ is the poet’s beloved friend whom he refers to in the poem ‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?’. 

Death shall not be able to brag about its power over every mortal as the poet’s friend, despite being a mortal, will achieve immortality through the poet’s verse. Death will never be able to make the poet’s friend surrender to it. Although death comes down in every creature’s life yet it cannot touch upon the poet’s friend as he will be immortalised in the poet’s words.