This sonnet, seemingly simple and straightforward, is actually more complex. The speaker gazes at man gazing at a woman, and in so doing, exposes the dishonesty of his art. By beautifying a woman to fulfill his fantasy image of a saint or angel, he creates a false image of a woman's life.

The speaker calls out the artist out for his indifference and self-absorption. She suggests he should tell a more real story about the women he paints.

The issue of how women were depicted by men in art became an acute issue in the twentieth century, though it had a been a running theme since at least the seventeenth century. Rossetti, however, is ahead of her time in addressing this issue so directly in the Victorian era.

I think the theme of this poem is idealized beauty. The artist paints the same imaginary woman over and over again, always hoping but continually failing to definitively capture the beauty he imagines. In a broader sense, the poem might be interpreted as being about mankind's futile struggle for perfection or for perfect, transcendent beauty.

Throughout the poem Rossetti alludes to the idealized nature of the woman. She is referred to as "a queen in opal," "A saint, an angel," "Fair as the moon and joyful as the light." This is most likely no ordinary woman that the artist has seen but rather an idealized, angelic version of a woman that he has only imagined. And, more to the point, that he can only imagine.

The fact that the artist tries to capture this idealized beauty in the form and figure of a woman might even be considered incidental. The woman is perhaps merely the physical form that the artist chooses to use to try and capture a metaphysical, spiritual beauty. In other words, the female form is merely the closest physical approximation, that the artist has at his disposal, of the metaphysical beauty he imagines.

Whether the female form matters or not, the beauty which the artist tries to capture is something so necessary to him that it is said to sustain him. Indeed, Rossetti writes that, "He feeds upon her face by day and night." As food sustains the body, so too this beauty sustains the mind, or maybe the spirit, of the artist. And just like the satisfaction one gets from food is only temporary, so too the satisfaction the artist gets from his paintings is only temporary, because the beauty inevitably always eludes him. Thus, the artist feels a compulsion to "feed" over and over, "by day and night," in a vain attempt to capture and comprehend a beauty that is fundamentally incomprehensible.

In this poem, Christina Rossetti explores a number of key themes. Perhaps the most striking of these is the theme of female objectification. Rossetti demonstrates this through the various female models who appear in this artist's studio. There is the "queen," for example, the "nameless girl" and the "angel." These identities are very limited and one-dimensional and Rossetti does this deliberately. She wants the reader to realize that these identities are a male creation and do not reflect the true range of the female experience.

Similarly, male power is another important theme in this poem and this is shown through the portrayal of the male artist. He is in control of the women he paints, for instance, because he "feeds" upon them and controls how they are appear on the canvas. But, according to Rossetti, the power of this male artist is really an illusion. It is the female figure who is truly powerful because, in spite of the treatment she receives, she is a joyful and happy figure, full of "hope" and optimism for the future.

Tone is how the author feels about her subject, and I would describe Rosetti's tone here as critical, even judgmental. She harshly describes male artists who also seem incapable of portraying a woman, no matter who she is or how she acts, with anything other than "The same one meaning." The artist does not depict a woman "as she is," but, rather, "as she fills his dream." He only depicts what he wants her to be rather than what she is. The repetition of the phrase, "Not as she is," two times—once on each of the last two lines of the poem—as well as the reference to the artist's dream of his female subject rather than her actual self conveys Rosetti's negative feelings about how women are represented in art produced by men. Further, the speaker says that the male artist "feeds upon her face by day and night," depicting him as some sort of vampire or parasite; to say that he "feeds" on her is an especially critical word choice because it is difficult to imagine any way in which this action could be positive.

The tone of a work of literature can be defined as the attitude that the author takes on the them, a character or an object within that work of literature. When we consider the overwhelming message of this excellent poem, which regards the way that men view and construct an idealised view of womanhood and femininity that springs from their own imagination and has nothing to do with the way that women themselves view their position and gender in society, we can describe the tone as sad and sombre, as the speaker reflects upon this state of affairs in her culture and society. Note how this wistful and sombre mood is created in the last three lines of the poem:

Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim;
Not as she is; but was when hope shone bright;
Not as she is, but as she fills his dream.

The way that the female subject of this poem is described clearly highlights the negative impact of this idealisation upon her. She is described as a mere shadow of her former self, "when hope shone bright." She now only has existence, not in her actual appearance (and note how the four words "Not as she is" are repeated to emphasise this) but only as "she fills his dream." She is interpreted and portrayed from his perspective, rather than having any reality or life of her own. Thus the sombre tone of the poem is established.