Sonnet 42 - 'My future will not copy fair my past'

Informal # 3

Blog # 3

XLII

'My future will not copy fair my past'—
I wrote that once; and thinking at my side
My ministering life-angel justified
The word by his appealing look upcast
To the white throne of God, I turned at last,
And there, instead, saw thee, not unallied
To angels in thy soul! Then I, long tried
By natural ills, received the comfort fast,
While budding, at thy sight, my pilgrim's staff
Gave out green leaves with morning dews impearled.
I seek no copy now of life's first half:
Leave here the pages with long musing curled,
And write me new my future's epigraph,
New angel mine, unhoped for in the world!

   The poet says that her future will not define her past. Things in the past would not formulate her future. Past events will be forever in the past and it is upon her what would happen in the future.

   Such events happened to the author's life made her wrote a sonnet like this. In my assumption, the author finally moved on what happened in her past which is miserable. So she tries to forget it and seek something positive in her future. Maybe this is the time she found her lover, Robert Browning. She felt such bliss when she met him forgetting her dull and unmemorable past. She is fulfilled of her present life now and she doesn't need to reminisce her life before. she harvested joy in her present life. 

   Still, there are other possible reasons for the message of the sonnet. It can be her other personal experiences in her life.