The Sonnets (Modern)
Not Peer Reviewed
945
64
¶When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced
¶The rich proud cost of outworn buried age;
¶When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed,
¶And brass eternal slave to mortal rage;
950When I have seen the hungry ocean gain
¶Advantage on the kingdom of the shore,
¶And the firm soil win of the wat'ry main,
¶Increasing store with loss, and loss with store;
¶When I have seen such interchange of state,
955Or state itself confounded to decay,
¶Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate
¶That Time will come and take my love away.
¶_This thought is as a death, which cannot choose
¶_But weep to have that which it fears to lose.
960
65
¶Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea,
¶But sad mortality o'ersways their power,
¶How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,
¶Whose action is no stronger than a flower?
965Oh, how shall summer's honey breath hold out
¶Against the wrackful siege of batt'ring days
¶When rocks impregnable are not so stout,
¶Nor gates of steel so strong, but time decays?
¶Oh, fearful meditation! Where, alack,
970Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid?
¶Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back,
¶Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?
¶_O, none, unless this miracle have might,
¶_That in black ink my love may still shine bright.
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66
¶Tired with all these for restful death I cry:
¶As to behold desert a beggar born,
¶And needy nothing trimmed in jollity,
¶And purest faith unhappily forsworn,
980And gilded honor shamefully misplaced,
¶And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted,
¶And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,
¶And strength by limping sway disabled,
¶And art made tongue-tied by authority,
985And folly, doctor-like, controlling skill,
¶And simple truth miscalled simplicity,
¶And captive good attending captain ill:
¶_Tired with all these, from these would I be gone,
¶_Save that to die I leave my love alone.