You are here

"grubs and eyelessl skulls"
Imagery
Act 5,
Scene 3
Lines 125-126

An imagery of the worms that consume a dead body and the skulls that remain in myShakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, Act 5, Scene 3.

Friar Laurence

What torch is yond, that vainly lends his light
To grubs and eyeless skulls? As I discern,

Shakespeare often depicts the flesh of the body after death being consumed by worms, leaving just the skeleton. For example, when Mercutio realizes that he's been mortally wounded, he exclaims, “They have made worms' meat of me.” Here, the friar is saying that the light from the lantern is useless to the worms and skulls in the graveyard since neither of them has eyes.