This poem, using the modern meaning of coy, fits into the carpe diem style of poetry as stated in footnote 3. The “coquettishness” of the speaker’s mistress speaks to the idea that sexual attraction is very playful and almost easy in young age. That is juxtaposed later in the poem when the speaker talks about the eventual death of him and his mistress, “Thy beauty shall no more be found,” basically saying that her beauty will run out with time and age. This connects to the main idea I found in the poem, the speaker essentially telling his mistress that they need to “seize the day” and focus on making the time they have now count so as to beat the clock. The poem does so by personifying the sun in line 45–also personifying the sun do to the link between time and orbiting the sun. To paraphrase, the speaker says in the last two lines: We can not make our own time, but if we slow down and stand still in these smaller moments we can make time run differently.

I think the underlying competition between the lovers and time is really interesting in this poem. Especially paying attention to the title, that the lover which the speaker talks about is (I assume) his mistress. This creates conflict between the lovers and their ages, that they are trying to fight against their age and what time does to them and their ability to love each other as young people do. 

Finally, I also think it’s interesting that the speaker sets up the poem by saying, my love for you is infinite–but we only have a certain amount of time. He uses hyperbole and metaphor to set up this argument, comparing the end of his love to the end of ‘recorded history’. The idea of fitting infinite into a finite space really intrigues me, especially that the speaker is almost denying that his love will ever end while arguing that their relationship and her beauty will; hence the style of the poem being a message about maximizing the day/’seizing’ the day.