In Sonnet 2, Shakespeare stresses to his lover that beauty will not last, and that it is selfish and foolish for anyone not to prepare for the loss of beauty and youth by having a child to carry on unsurpassed beauty. The sonnet can be cynically seen as Shakespeare's attempt to get his lover to sleep with him rather than as a lesson in living life.
In the first quatrain Shakespeare says that later on, your youth will be worthless. The greatness of your youth, admired by everyone now, will be, will be as worthless as a "tatter'd weed of small worth held". Shakespeare says this worthlessness will be when forty years of age wrinkles your brow and when there are, "deep trenches in thy beauty's field". The personification is seen in the metaphor: "deep trenches in thy beauty's field" which can be seen as wrinkles in a beautiful face. This gives readers a picture of the old age that has yet to come for some.

In the second quatrain, when what has yet to come for some has came, and when you are asked, where is your beauty now? And when you're asked, "where are all the treasures of thy lusty days?" You must reply that These "treasures of thy lusty days" or offspring from your youth are lost in "thine own deep sunken eyes" states the poet. In this place of old age where your youth is, is also greed and self-obsession which is written as "all-eating shame and thriftless praise" by Shakespeare. The metaphor of "all-eating shame" is effective in how readers sense a feeling of negativity from the words of Shakespeare's hand. In the third quatrain, where Shakespeare's hand rhymes of regret, the ideal answer is shown. The poet states, "This fair child of mine shall sum my account and make my old excuse, proving his beauty by succession thine!" This was the answer wished to be used but could not be. Shakespeare says, "How much more praise deserved thy beauty's use" which regrets, if only your beauty could have been put to a greater use.

The couplet then describes what it would be like to have this baby. Shakespeare poetically states that this baby would be "new made when thou art old" This means that the baby would be young while you are old. The final line tells how you would see your own blood flow warm through the baby while you are cold. "And see thy warm blood when thou feel'st it cold."