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- Edition: The Sonnets
The Sonnets (Modern)
- Texts of this edition
- Facsimiles
2161145
2162Those lips that Love's own hand did make
2163Breathed forth the sound that said "I hate,"
2164To me, that languished for her sake;
2165But when she saw my woeful state,
2166Straight in her heart did mercy come,
2167Chiding that tongue that, ever sweet,
2168Was used in giving gentle doom,
2169And taught it thus anew to greet:
2170"I hate" she altered with an end
2171That followed it as gentle day
2172Doth follow night who, like a fiend,
2173From heaven to hell is flown away.
2174 "I hate" from "hate" away she threw,
2175 And saved my life, saying "not you."
2176146
2177Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth,
2178Thrall to these rebel powers that thee array,
2179Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth,
2180Painting thy outward walls so costly gay?
2181Why so large cost, having so short a lease,
2182Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend?
2183Shall worms, inheritors of this excess,
2184Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end?
2185Then soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss,
2186And let that pine to aggravate thy store;
2187Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross,
2188Within be fed, without be rich no more.
2189 So shalt thou feed on death, that feeds on men,
2190 And death once dead, there's no more dying then.
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2192My love is as a fever, longing still
2193For that which longer nurseth the disease,
2194Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill,
2195Th'uncertain sickly appetite to please:
2196My reason, the physician to my love,
2197Angry that his prescriptions are not kept,
2198Hath left me, and I desperate now approve
2199Desire is death, which physic did except.
2200Past cure I am, now reason is past care,
2201And frantic-mad with evermore unrest,
2202My thoughts and my discourse as madmen's are,
2203At random from the truth vainly expressed.
2204 For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright,
2205 Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.