She Who List Not Those Who List Her: "Whoso list to hunt" by Sir Thomas Wyatt

Whoso list to hunt, I know where is an hind, 

But as for me, alas, I may no more;
The vain travail hath wearied me so sore,
I am of them that farthest cometh behind.
Yet may I by no means my wearied mind
Draw from the deer, but as she fleeth afore,
Fainting I follow. I leave off therefore,
Since in a net I seek to hold the wind,
As well as I may spend his time in vain;
And graven with diamonds in letters plain
There is written her fair neck round about,
Noli me tangere, for Caesar's I am,
And wild for to hold, though I seem tame.

List = desire
Travail = labor

It is pretty well established how creepy Petrarchan poetry is, however, this poem feels a touch different for me. Just this once, I hear the women behind the words.

The speaker says /in a net I seek to hold the wind/ (line 8), the "wind" could be taken two ways. One: this wind-women is fickle, and too ethereal to grasp; this view lines up with Petrarchism. Two: the wind-women is too strong, powerful or maybe even too destructive to hold; this one sounds threatening and a certain kind of women would take this as a compliment, this is the women I hear.

"Noli me tangere" latin for "do not touch me"

The reference in line twelve is twisted into a really gross understanding. Essentially the women is physically marked, tattooed, on here neck with her owns her. But it is the last line of the sonnet is what changed that meaning for me. The syntax of the poem makes the final line, /And wild for to hold, though I seem tame/ (14), seem like a continuation of the proceeding line, making it appear that line fourteen is text that is also found written on the women's neck. Why then does the inscription use a personal pronoun, twice, to get the point across? When we take into consideration the metaphorical potential of the poem referencing Wyatt's history with Anne Boleyn we can apply a more realistic idea. The lines instead represent a piece of jewelry, such as a necklace worn, by choice or not, around /her fair neck/ (12). This offers a visual warning to others that she "belongs" to another. The personal pronoun "I" used here points to the choice made to continue to wear this ownership. The final line is the women openly warning others to leave her alone. She addresses onlookers, /And wild for to hold, though I seem tame/ (14), telling them that just because she seems like someone they want, that it would be fun to "hold" her, she is decidedly "tame": not interested.

The modern era is no stranger to unwanted male attention towards women. As seen in Wyatt's poem, women develop visual cues in order to combat some of these attentions. Some single women will wear fake wedding bands when they go out as an easy symbol to say, "No thanks, I'm married". It seems time to inscribe those fake bans with the latin "noli me tangere", do not touch me.