 This "triad" of poems relates to the group of sonnets 66–68, for "Their respective themes, Time's ruin (63-65) and the Former Age, a pristine earlier world now in ruin and decay (66-68), were conventionally associated in Shakespeare's day," suggesting that the sonnets were written as a related group meant to be distinctly categorized.Shakespearean scholar Helen Vendler characterizes Sonnet 65 as a "defective key word" sonnet.Often, Shakespeare will use a particular word prominently in each quatrain, prompting the reader to look for it in the couplet and note any change in usage.