Sonnet 73

 That time of year thou may'st in me behold

 When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang

 Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,

 Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

 In me thou see'st the twilight of such day,

 As after sunset fadeth in the west,

 Which by-and-by black night doth take away,

 Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.

 In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire

 That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,

 As the death-bed whereon it must expire

 Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.

    This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong,

    To love that well which thou must leave ere long.

It's  sonnet of an older man to a younger one who has been friend and admirer. I always thought it was “Pale ruined choirs,” not “Bare ruined choirs,” for some unaccountable reason.  I knew it referred the chancel, that part of the building where the choir sang, not the singers themselves, but I used it to refer to people I sang with in a pub in London in 1997. Like them, I had once sung well and might have aspired to even more with discipline.  That was now past, but the melancholy was quite mild.  The singing was for the pleasure and camaraderie of it now, and how much loss is that, really? A ruined church, of which there were many in Shakespeare’s day 60 years after the dissolution of the monasteries carries something of grandeur of it even in its decline.  One  can find many commentaries, all wiser than anything I can bring you, but two things in the second line did jump out at me, which I think are consistent with the mood of the poem as a whole.  The leaves are yellow, not brown.  While later death may be suggested, death has not yet arrived, as also with the embers below, and those have beauties of their own beyond mere autumnal melancholy. Supporting this is the phrasing yellow leaves, or none, or few. If the idea was to suggest decay and death it would have been yellow leaves, or few, or none in a pattern. The course is reversed in mid sentence.  No, it’s not no leaves, my lad. The day is still fine.