This second sonnet prologue mirrors the first but with a crucial difference: the first prologue spoke of hate and death; this one speaks of love and desire. The structure creates a deliberate parallel that underscores the play's central tension between love and hate."Old desire" (Rosaline) dying on its "deathbed" while "young affection" (Juliet) rises is a metaphor of succession — one love replaces another almost instantaneously, which subtly questions whether Romeo's new love is any more substantial than the old.The couplet — "passion lends them power, time means, to meet / Tempering extremities with extreme sweet" — is the prologue's thesis: love will overcome obstacles, but only by "tempering" (balancing) extreme danger with extreme sweetness. The word "extremities" foreshadows the extreme measures both lovers will eventually take.Shakespeare may have intended this prologue to be cut in performance — many productions omit it. Its function is primarily structural: marking the transition from Act I's setup to Act II's romantic development....