English Poetry I: From Chaucer to Gray.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14. |
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| 119. Sixty-fifth Sonnet |
| | | William Shakespeare (1564–1616) |
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| 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? | |
| O how shall summer’s honey breath hold out | 5 |
| Against the wreckful siege of battering days, | |
| When rocks impregnable are not so stout | |
| Nor gates of steel so strong, but time decays? | |
| O fearful meditation! where, alack! | |
| Shall Time’s best jewel from Time’s chest lie hid? | 10 |
| 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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