"Sonnet" by Billy Collins

In this poem by Billy Collins, the line that stuck out to me the most was "Blow out the candles and come at last to bed. Patriarch was writing so much that his wife asked him to basically stop writing and go to bed. It seems like she was getting annoyed and aggravated that he kept writing and spent more attention on the things that he was writing instead of on her. She seems to be a person who got jealous that she got less attention.

It seems like writing is something that this man loves to do. When you love to do something so much, it is hard to just stop and go do something else. It is like when your mother tells you to stop doing something and go eat dinner, it is hard because you don't even want to take a break. I can relate to this man. Although I don't like to read, I do like to write stories and I understand how hard it is to stop when someone tells you too.

I feel like the man's wife doesn't respect his decision to write or read like he does. She seems to want all that attention that her husband is giving to the book. I don't think that this relationship would work because if she doesn't respect something that he loves to do, then why would Patriarch want to stay with her? If Patriarch is spending way too much time on his work, then I would understand why the woman feels that his work is taking over too much of his time and maybe he should just take a break.