One interpretation of the sonnet by Hilton Landry interprets the last line in a slightly different light. He proposes that Sonnet 53 is part of a tentative group stretching from Sonnet 43 to Sonnet 58 which have in common the speaker's separation from the youth. Sonnet 53 in itself makes no mention of absence from the youth, but connects to this larger group via similar themes and word choices. Landry points out that seven other poems, sonnets 27, 37, 43, 61, 98, 99, and 113, connect separation with images of shadows. He notes that it is only when the speaker is absent from his friend that he begins to speak of shadows and images. Separation, Landry says, causes the poet's imagination to begin, "to find, or rather project, many images of the friend's beauty in his surroundings".