The expense of spirit is a sonnet, written by William Shakespeare. It is organized into 14 lines (three quatrains and a final rhyming couplet, it follows the Elizabethan model). Besides the sonnet is a part of a collection because the first line and the title are the same.                                                                                                                                                                                             Just reading  the title I expect the poem will be about waste of energy. Considering the denotative level, the reader can notice that the function of the first quatrain is to introduce the concept of lust and to describe it. Lust is defined by Shakespeare by some negative adjectives: perjured, murd'rous, bloody, full of blame, savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust. In addition, the poet starts the first stanza with a statement: the expense of spirit in a waste of shame is lust in act. This statement refers to the act of a sexual intercourse. The reader can understand  the poet  things that when sex isn't used to give life, it is sinful. In the second quatrain the poet says that people want lust but when it arrives, it is despised. The reader can observe that the poet doesn't use  the word "orgasm" but he says "enjoyed lust", because the first term isn't suitable for literature. Besides the poet affirms that the effects of lust lasts  a short time. In the second quatrain indeed, the poet focuses his description on the "swallowed bait" and "taker", that is referred to the woman. In the third quatrain the poet wants to reinforced the concept of lust: the speaking voice says that people become made to look for it and make excessive things to have it.  In the final stanza, when Shakespeare gives a conclusion, the speaking voice says that the world knows all these things, but none can avoid the heaven that bring men to the hell.                                                                                                                                                                                      Concerning the connotative level, the reader can observe, in the first stanza, that the syntactic choice of  describes with adjectives the lust, underlines the strength of lust. In addition the term "savage" reminds something to the animal instinct, so humans are considered animals. The adjectives "rude" and "cruel" describe the behavior of people when they try to have the joy of lust with violence. In the third and in the fourth line of the first stanza there is a repetition of harsh sounds to memorize in the reader's mind the concepts. In the following stanza the lines are short because the poet wants to underlines that the effect of an orgasm lasts only a short time. Besides there is a repetition of some words (past reasons), to indicate the unreason of the men in this moment. "The taker mad" is referred to the swallowed bait. In the third quatrain  is interesting to notice the repetition of the verb "have" conjugated in different tenses.                                                                                                                                                                                                                    In conclusion in this sonnet, the poet wants to explain his opinion about this argue. He things that strong sexual desire is a fugitive sense of pleasure that bring the man from the heaven to the hell.