61 Shakespeare - Sonnets

O! how much more doth beauty beauteous seem
O! how thy worth with manners may I sing
O! lest the world should task you to recite
O! never say that I was false of heart
O! that you were yourself; but, love, you are
Or I shall live your epitaph to make
Or whether doth my mind, being crown'd with you
Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth
Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind
Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea
So am I as the rich, whose blessed key
So are you to my thoughts as food to life
So is it not with me as with that Muse
So oft have I invok'd thee for my Muse
So shall I live, supposing thou art true
So, now I have confess'd that he is thine
Some glory in their birth, some in their skill
Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness
Sweet love, renew thy force; be it not said
Take all my loves, my love, yea, take them all
That god forbid that made me first your slave
That thou art blam'd shall not be thy defect
That thou hast her it is not all my grief
That time of year thou mayst in me behold
That you were once unkind befriends me now
The expense of spirit in a waste of shame
The forward violet thus did I chide
The little Love-god lying once asleep
The other two, slight air and purging fire
Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now
Then let not winter's ragged hand deface
They that have power to hurt and will do none
Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me
Those hours, that with gentle work did frame
Those lines that I before have writ do lie
Those lips that Love's own hand did make
Those parts of thee that the world's eye doth view
Those pretty wrongs that liberty commits
Thou art as tyrannous, so as thou art
Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes
Thus can my love excuse the slow offence
Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn
Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts
Thy gift, thy tables, are within my brain
Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear
Tir'd with all these, for restful death I cry
To me, fair friend, you never can be old
Two loves I have of comfort and despair
Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend
Was it the proud full sail of his great verse
Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed
Were 't aught to me I bore the canopy
What 's in the brain, that ink may character
What is your substance, whereof are you made
What potions have I drunk of Siren tears
When I consider every thing that grows
When I do count the clock that tells the time
When I have seen by Time's fell hand defac'd
........
That thou hast her it is not all my grief
  _
THAT thou hast her, it is not all my grief
And yet it may be said I lov'd her dearly;
That she hath thee, is of my wailing chief,   _
A loss in love that touches me more nearly.
Loving offenders, thus I will excuse ye:
Thou dost love her, because thou know'st I love her;   _
And for my sake even so doth she abuse me,
Suffering my friend for my sake to approve her.
If I lose thee, my loss is my love's gain,   _
And losing her, my friend hath found that loss;
Both find each other, and I lose both twain,
And both for my sake lay on me this cross   _

But here 's the joy; my friend and I are one
Sweet flattery! then she loves but me alone.
........
That time of year thou mayst in me behold
  _
THAT time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,   _
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.
In me thou see'st the twilight of such day
As after sunset fadeth in the west;   _
Which by and by black night doth take away,
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.
In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire,   _
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,
As the death-bed whereon it must expire
Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.   _

This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong,
To love that well which thou must leave ere long.
........
That you were once unkind befriends me now
  _
THAT you were once unkind befriends me now
And for that sorrow, which I then did feel,
Needs must I under my transgression bow,   _
Unless my nerves were brass or hammer'd steel.
For if you were by my unkindness shaken,
As I by yours, you 've pass'd a hell of time;   _
And I, a tyrant, have no leisure taken
To weigh how once I suffer'd in your crime.
O! that our night of woe might have remember'd   _
My deepest sense, how hard true sorrow hits,
And soon to you, as you to me, then tender'd
The humble salve which wounded bosoms fits!   _

But that your trespass now becomes a fee
Mine ransoms yours, and yours must ransom me.
........
The expense of spirit in a waste of shame
  _
THE EXPENSE of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action; and till action, lust
Is perjur'd, murderous, bloody, full of blame,   _
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;
Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight;
Past reason hunted; and no sooner had,   _
Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait,
On purpose laid to make the taker mad:
Mad in pursuit, and in possession so;   _
Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme;
A bliss in proof, - and prov'd, a very woe;
Before, a joy propos'd; behind, a dream.   _

All this the world well knows; yet none knows well
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.
........
The forward violet thus did I chide
  _
THE FORWARD violet thus did I chide
Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells,
If not from my love's breath? The purple pride   _
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dy'd.
The lily I condemned for thy hand,   _
And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair;
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,
One blushing shame, another white despair;   _
A third, nor red nor white, had stol'n of both,
And to his robbery had annex'd thy breath;
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth   _
A vengeful canker eat him up to death.

More flowers I noted, yet I none could see   _
But sweet or colour it had stol'n from thee.
........
The little Love-god lying once asleep
  _
THE LITTLE Love-god lying once asleep
Laid by his side his heart-inflaming brand,
Whilst many nymphs that vow'd chaste life to keep   _
Came tripping by; but in her maiden hand
The fairest votary took up that fire
Which many legions of true hearts had warm'd;   _
And so the general of hot desire
Was, sleeping, by a virgin hand disarm'd.
This brand she quenched in a cool well by,   _
Which from Love's fire took heat perpetual,
Growing a bath and healthful remedy
For men diseas'd; but I, my mistress' thrall,   _

Came there for cure, and this by that I prove,
Love's fire heats water, water cools not love.
........
The other two, slight air and purging fire
  _
THE OTHER two, slight air and purging fire,
Are both with thee, wherever I abide;
The first my thought, the other my desire,   _
These present-absent with swift motion slide.
For when these quicker elements are gone
In tender embassy of love to thee,   _
My life, being made of four, with two alone
Sinks down to death, oppress'd with melancholy;
Until life's composition be recur'd   _
By those swift messengers return'd from thee,
Who even but now come back again, assur'd
Of thy fair health, recounting it to me   _

This told, I joy; but then no longer glad,
I send them back again, and straight grow sad.
........
Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now
  _
THEN hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now
Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross,
Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow,   _
And do not drop in for an after-loss:
Ah! do not, when my heart hath 'scap'd this sorrow,
Come in the rearward of a conquer'd woe;   _
Give not a windy night a rainy morrow,
To linger out a purpos'd overthrow.
If thou wilt leave me, do not leave me last,   _
When other petty griefs have done their spite,
But in the onset come: so shall I taste
At first the very worst of fortune's might   _

And other strains of woe, which now seem woe,
Compar'd with loss of thee will not seem so.
........
Then let not winter's ragged hand deface
  _
THEN let not winter's ragged hand deface
In thee thy summer, ere thou be distill'd:
Make sweet some vial; treasure thou some place   _
With beauty's treasure, ere it be self-kill'd.
That use is not forbidden usury,
Which happies those that pay the willing loan;   _
That's for thyself to breed another thee,
Or ten times happier, be it ten for one;
Ten times thyself were happier than thou art,   _
If ten of thine ten times refigur'd thee;
Then what could death do, if thou shouldst depart,
Leaving thee living in posterity?   _

Be not self-will'd, for thou art much too fair
To be death's conquest and make worms thine heir.
........
They that have power to hurt and will do none
  _
THEY that have power to hurt and will do none
That do not do the thing they most do show,
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone,   _
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow;
They rightly do inherit heaven's graces,
And husband nature's riches from expense;   _
They are the lords and owners of their faces,
Others but stewards of their excellence.
The summer's flower is to the summer sweet,   _
Though to itself it only live and die,
But if that flower with base infection meet,
The basest weed outbraves his dignity   _

For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds.
........
Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me
  _
THINE eyes I love, and they, as pitying me
Knowing thy heart torment me with disdain,
Have put on black and loving mourners be,   _
Looking with pretty ruth upon my pain.
And truly not the morning sun of heaven
Better becomes the grey cheeks of the east,   _
Nor that full star that ushers in the even,
Doth half that glory to the sober west,
As those two mourning eyes become thy face:   _
O! let it then as well beseem thy heart
To mourn for me, since mourning doth thee grace,
And suit thy pity like in every part.   _

Then will I swear beauty herself is black,
And all they foul that thy complexion lack.