SONNET 13 FATHER: O! that you were your self; but, love, you are

O! that you were your self; but, love, you are
No longer yours, than you your self here live:
Against this coming end you should prepare,
And your sweet semblance to some other give:
So should that beauty which you hold in lease
Find no determination; then you were
Yourself again, after yourself's decease,
When your sweet issue your sweet form should bear.
Who lets so fair a house fall to decay,
Which husbandry in honour might uphold,
Against the stormy gusts of winter's day
And barren rage of death's eternal cold?
   O! none but unthrifts. Dear my love, you know,
   You had a father: let your son say so.


Mnemonic Image

FATHER

Memory Passage

Death places his SEAL upon TIME, assuming the role of the FATHER of Time, showing meaning in the ASTRONOMY of the stars, the figures of which move upon the STAGE in a poor COUNTERFEIT of reality. Death places it all into a TOMB for the duration of the zero SUMMER until is reborn like the PHOENIX with a new FACE.

Idiosyncratic Abstract:



Couplet Imagery

O! none but unthrifts. Dear my love, you know,
   You had a father: let your son say so.

The vocative O at the beginning and provocative O at the end. The sound of the sucker-punch to the gut. O. The poet invoking heaven by the O. The woman and her sweet O.

O*vaginal orifice. In R&J, the nurse puns on expressions of misery: 'For Juliet's sake . . . rise and stand. Why should you fall into so deep an O?' (cf. rise, stand). Another instance has been detected in the play: see medlar; Dekker evidently registered at least one, since his Satiromastix I.i.17 borrows the joke along with much else from R&J (Intro, p.3). In MVlWIV.i.45, 'the focative case' evokes the vagina (case for fucking), and grammatical puns continue when William describes its invocational use: 'O - vocativo, O - Nowadays commentators find many more instances than are admitted here. But representation of the Globe Theatre as a 'wooden O' (H5 Prol.13) both affirms Shakespeare's ease with 'O' symbolism and cautions about vaginal overloading - though the zealot might urge the sexual transactions of the stage: 'New plays and maidenheads are near akin' (TNK Prol.l). See boar, pen. 2. representing orgasmic gasps and sighs. See die, groan 3.

- Shakespeare's Sexual Language, Gordon Williams

Note that unthrift was more damning in the 14th century. Could those undertones still be resonate in the 16th?

unthrifty (adj.)
late 14c., "unprofitable, useless," from un- (1) "not" + thrifty (adj.), or else from Middle English noun unthrift "profligacy," late 14c., earlier "evil practice, wicked act" (c. 1300). 

- https://www.etymonline.com/word/unthrifty

O!... Son say so!

Q1

O! that you were your self; but, love, you are
No longer yours, than you your self here live:
Against this coming end you should prepare,
And your sweet semblance to some other give:

O you once were the true blue, the one original Rose, but love, sweet love, you are no longer in possession of that what you once were. Any more than that beauty lives in this language. You are fading even as this sonnet unfolds. By the couplet, you will be dead. Give the semblance. Worship the semblance! All hail the Semblance. If you keep it solely in your possession any longer, you will wither and rot just along with your dying self.

Look at the psych on the first line enjambment:

O that you were yourself...  but, love.... you ARE!

You are yourself, my love, what was I saying, you will live forever and there's no need to pass your beauty on...

But then, the second line: NO! No longer yours. You are no loger the self you once were. O No!



Q2

So should that beauty which you hold in lease
Find no determination; then you were
Yourself again, after yourself's decease,
When your sweet issue your sweet form should bear.

O So O So Son Say So O. So Should the Mighty Semblance which you are only leasing, not owning, for who can truly hold the Semblance, the One Original Rose, the Platonic Form emanating? But O so if you do not find a place in which to give it, then you beceome your self and that semblance dies with you.

Q3

Who lets so fair a house fall to decay,
Which husbandry in honour might uphold,
Against the stormy gusts of winter's day
And barren rage of death's eternal cold?

Whoooo? Ooo ooo? A quatrain as a question. Who ruins the house? Who allows it to fall into decay? What's wrong with your penis? Why do not keep it up? What sort of person would not keep up with the upkeep, not practice good hygienic husbandry? You know: keep the carpet swept and the chimney clear, flush the pipes and oil all the locks and hinges of your house body, of your Semblance? Moisturize your dry bones unit you belive the have skin again.

You should make sure all is ship shape for the stormy gusts and if you think they are bad, wait until you feel the barren rage, the childless rage, of death's eternal cold.

C

O! none but unthrifts. Dear my love, you know,
   You had a father: let your son say so.

Oooooooo OOOooooooo OOoooo ! It is you! You are the one who is going to suffer the stormy gusts, the barren rage and the eternal cold. And you know, you should know, becaue your father prepared himself by reproducing in you. Time to pass the rotting carcass of the buck before it starts to stink up the place. You had a Dad, now let your issue say the same for you. 

You, Terrible One, why did you rude so upon me? 

SONNET 12 TIME - When I do count the clock that tells the time,

When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls, all silvered o'er with white;
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves,
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves,
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,
Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow;
     And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
     Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

Mnemonic Image

TIME

Memory Passage

Death places his SEAL upon TIME, assuming the role of the FATHER of Time, showing meaning in the ASTRONOMY of the stars, the figures of which move upon the STAGE in a poor COUNTERFEIT of reality. Death places it all into a TOMB for the duration of the zero SUMMER until is reborn like the PHOENIX with a new FACE.

Idiosyncratic Abstract:

Couplet Imagery

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
     Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

I hear the Heideggerian Nothing in that nothing. What is Time's scythe? The inexorable sweeping hand of the clock mowing through the verses? What is the time inside the sonnet? For within the interior architecture of the poem, there is sanctuary - this played out in later sonnets. But for us, now, the memorization of the sonnet, the re-creation within our memory and the ability to "call it back," the double, the twin, the mirror, the representation.

Breed connotes the animal husbandry of a farmer and a sub-category of gay pornography.

Note the intimations of the afterlife in the "hence." And that it might be a hellish place, where there is need to be brave, or at least endure. 

Q1

When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls, all silvered o'er with white;

Tick tock goes the meter of that first line. Father Time stepping down the echoing hallways of memory. Brave day anticipates that later bravery of the long day's journey into night. Goya's drowning dog is emblematic of the brave day sunk into hideous night. The shriek of hideous damnation, hideous annihilation, the hideous features of the Abyss, of the monster. Counting moves on to beholding. And the sexual petals of the violet past prime. Tennessee Williams's in the whorehouse:

When I was fourteen, my father decided to initiate me into the ways of manhood, and took me to the local whorehouse. The woman spread her legs, and made me look between them. All I could see was something that looked like a dyin' orchid; consequently, I have never been comfortable around women or orchids.

And there is almost a time-lapse with the dark lady of sabled curls silvering white. That confusion of color with silver as a verb to whiten. The bloody bones silvered in the sun until they were pale with whiteness.

Q2

When lofty trees I see barren of leaves,
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves,
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,

The hero, the good man, the leader as the lofty tree. Moses with flowing locks, who once sheltered the herd, the good shepherd, turned the balding skeltal ghost of his former self. No longer able to even provide shade to disturb Diogenes. The herd now exposed to the hyenas of time.

Lusty green shoots and shafts of summer are girded up. Girding up the loins. Time's chastity. And carried around in-valid upon the stretcher. The summer soldier legless, armless. Moses with the white and bristly beard - morphing into Father Time himself.

Q3

Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow;

After having counted and beholded and seen all of the deprecatory effects of time, then I wonder. It makes me wonder. Not you! Your beauty may not fade nor wander down into the bad part of town, into the wastes of time. Thoreau: you cannot waste time without injuring eternity. But where is the Platonic Form? Here is the face to face I desire. Not the emanation. Not that which will be wasted by time, but the eternal, never fading.

Everything sweet turns bitter. Beauty must fade. Note the reification. The desire to fix beauty into permanence. There is the waterfall, not the water falling. Denial of process. Denial. Would Basho even understand the underlying desire of the sonnets?

C

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
     Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

And that Heideggerian Nothing is stronger here at the end than ever. Nothing CAN make defense.


"Nothing Exists" - the original ontological MacGuffin.

SONNET 11 SEAL: As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow'st

As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow'st
In one of thine, from that which thou departest;
And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestow'st,
Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth convertest.
Herein lives wisdom, beauty, and increase;
Without this folly, age, and cold decay:
If all were minded so, the times should cease
And threescore year would make the world away.
Let those whom nature hath not made for store,
Harsh, featureless, and rude, barrenly perish:
Look whom she best endowed, she gave the more;
Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish:
   She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby,
   Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.


Mnemonic Image

SEAL

Memory Passage

Death places his SEAL upon TIME, assuming the role of the FATHER of Time, showing meaning in the ASTRONOMY of the stars, the figures of which move upon the STAGE in a poor COUNTERFEIT of reality. Death places it all into a TOMB for the duration of the zero SUMMER until is reborn like the PHOENIX with a new FACE.

Idiosyncratic Abstract:



Couplet Imagery

She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby,
   Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.


Q1

As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow'st
In one of thine, from that which thou departest;
And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestow'st,
Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth convertest.

The image of the Paglian male withdrawing empty, spent, lifeless from the Chthonian womb of the Great Mother. The man is granted entrance into the Sanctum Sanctorum for his primal face-to-face with the monstrous God. He is overwhelmed and taken by grace into a state of ecstasy - out of body, out of flesh. The consciousness of the sonnet is at the one interval beyond the zenith, that roller coaster click and clack of climbing up and up preceding the Fall, there is a moment of weightless being, perhaps unbearable, but not of any inhuman duration. From ecstatic height of the spirit, the constant ringing bell tone of the orgasm,  the time out of time, out of mind, we come back into the flesh. Post-coitum sorrows. You shall come back into yourself after you have spent your seed inside the temple of the Goddess, but that great red ribbon, that double helix of your self continues to rise and grow within god's mind. And it is only when you see that fresh blood, that red ribbon that unspooled from the pearly white cloud of your cumming, when you see as it emerges out of the temple of god's mystery screaming and laughing with your face, your sweet semblance. It is only then that you may call it yours. It is your child. Grown, as Shakespeare would have it, in the divine ground of the woman's womb, signaling your conversion from youth to adulthood, from boy to man.

Q2

Herein lives wisdom, beauty, and increase;
Without this folly, age, and cold decay:
If all were minded so, the times should cease
And threescore year would make the world away.

The Platonic Triad of Beauty, Truth and Goodness here rendered as Beauty, Wisdom and Increase. Countered by Age, Folly and Decay. To not reproduce, to not create, to not live according to the transcendental emanations of beauty and wisdom and increase (creation), is to forfeit your humanity, your sacred duty and to descend into the world of shadows and fire, where all is subject to the ugliness of age, the ignorance of folly and the forces of rapid decay. This is the new categorical imperative, to not be so minded to to rebel against history, to hate the world, to seek the annihilation of all being, to make the world away.

Q3

Let those whom nature hath not made for store,
Harsh, featureless, and rude, barrenly perish:
Look whom she best endowed, she gave the more;
Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish:

Let those cave dwellers, those Morlocks, who live in the Dantean underworld and know only age and folly and decay, let them perish without reproduction. Another triad to ornament the monstrous faes in hell: harsh, featureless and rude. Not worthy of reproduction.

Look in the mirror. Look in your pants. The resonate meanings of endowed. Look to your own mind. You have been given more. You are an abundance. An overflowing container for beauty and truth and goodness. And you should never take for granted the bounteous, over abundant, super human gifts you were given.

C

She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby,
   Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.


The Goddess (Nature - See T. Hughes) carved out out of the semen and egg that formed within a woman's womb as her seal, as her divine form in the flesh. The Word made Flesh. The Word Carved into the figure and face of a man. And she did this for you to reproduce your self, physically, intellectually and spiritually. You are the source of the copy. You are the original. It is your duty to fertilize your life and spread your seed, make more, infect the dark and hollow world with beauty, truth and goodness to counter the grey harsh, featureless, rude viral tide of folly, age and cold decay.




- Death of son, Hamnet, on 11 August 1596

SONNET 62 TANNED ANTIQUITY: Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye

Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
And for this sin there is no remedy,
It is so grounded inward in my heart.
Methinks no face so gracious is as mine,
No shape so true, no truth of such account;
And for myself mine own worth do define,
As I all other in all worths surmount.
But when my glass shows me myself indeed
Beated and chopp'd with tanned antiquity,
Mine own self-love quite contrary I read;
Self so self-loving were iniquity.
   'Tis thee, myself, that for myself I praise,
   Painting my age with beauty of thy days.


Mnemonic Image

TANNED ANTIQUITY

Memory Passage

WAVES on the Ocean of Time crash upon the pebbled shore where stands the WATCHMAN whose face is a model of TANNED ANTIQUITY

Idiosyncratic Abstract:

Couplet Imagery

'Tis thee, myself, that for myself I praise,
   Painting my age with beauty of thy days.

painting / cosmetic / cf. S68 & S69, S101


Q1

Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
And for this sin there is no remedy,
It is so grounded inward in my heart.

Q2

Methinks no face so gracious is as mine,
No shape so true, no truth of such account;
And for myself mine own worth do define,
As I all other in all worths surmount.

Q3

But when my glass shows me myself indeed
Beated and chopp'd with tanned antiquity,
Mine own self-love quite contrary I read;
Self so self-loving were iniquity.

C

'Tis thee, myself, that for myself I praise,
   Painting my age with beauty of thy days.

SONNET 61 WATCHMAN: To play the watchman ever for thy sake

Is it thy will, thy image should keep open
My heavy eyelids to the weary night?
Dost thou desire my slumbers should be broken,
While shadows like to thee do mock my sight?
Is it thy spirit that thou send'st from thee
So far from home into my deeds to pry,
To find out shames and idle hours in me,
The scope and tenor of thy jealousy?
O, no! thy love, though much, is not so great:
It is my love that keeps mine eye awake:
Mine own true love that doth my rest defeat,
To play the watchman ever for thy sake:
   For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,
   From me far off, with others all too near.


Mnemonic Image

WATCHMAN

Memory Passage

WAVES on the Ocean of Time crash upon the pebbled shore where stands the WATCHMAN

Idiosyncratic Abstract:

Couplet Imagery

For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,
   From me far off, with others all too near

Watching theme
resonance of wake from sleep / funeral wake / wake as party


Q1

Is it thy will, thy image should keep open
My heavy eyelids to the weary night?
Dost thou desire my slumbers should be broken,
While shadows like to thee do mock my sight?

Neoplatonic theme
 cf S27, S53
heavy v weary
image v shadows
the inner sight mocked by imitative shadows

Q2

Is it thy spirit that thou send'st from thee
So far from home into my deeds to pry,
To find out shames and idle hours in me,
The scope and tenor of thy jealousy?

self-paranoia

Q3

O, no! thy love, though much, is not so great:
It is my love that keeps mine eye awake:
Mine own true love that doth my rest defeat,
To play the watchman ever for thy sake:

tonal drop from much to great
mine eye / mine own

the watchman
guarding the towers
watchman what of the night?

C

For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,
   From me far off, with others all too near.

Sonnet 60 WAVES: Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore,
So do our minutes hasten to their end;
Each changing place with that which goes before,
In sequent toil all forwards do contend.
Nativity, once in the main of light,
Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd,
Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight,
And Time that gave doth now his gift confound.
Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow,
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth,
And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow:
   And yet to times in hope, my verse shall stand
   Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

Mnemonic Image

WAVES

Memory Passage

WAVES on the Ocean of Time

Idiosyncratic Abstract

The waves containing the ashes of my dead parents

Couplet Imagery

And yet to times in hope, my verse shall stand
   Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

Standing vs Cruel Hand

Q1

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore,
So do our minutes hasten to their end;
Each changing place with that which goes before,
In sequent toil all forwards do contend.

60 as the number of minutes in the hour

favorite line: In sequent toil all forwards do contend.

Q2

Nativity, once in the main of light,
Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown'd,
Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight,
And Time that gave doth now his gift confound.


progression: nativity to maturity to crooked eclipses to confound
gave / gift

Q3

Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow,
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth,
And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow:

lovely delves the parallels
beauty's brow cf S19

Time as the cruel lepidopterist || feeds on rarities - the hunger of time ||
 nothing STANDS || scythe mow

C

And yet to times in hope, my verse shall stand
   Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

cf. S12 - heavy meter in L11 like time's hand ticking

Time and Hope || verse shall STAND || Time's cruel hand

SONNET 79 SICK MUSE: Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid

Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid,
My verse alone had all thy gentle grace;
But now my gracious numbers are decayed,
And my sick Muse doth give an other place.
I grant, sweet love, thy lovely argument
Deserves the travail of a worthier pen;
Yet what of thee thy poet doth invent
He robs thee of, and pays it thee again.
He lends thee virtue, and he stole that word
From thy behaviour; beauty doth he give,
And found it in thy cheek: he can afford
No praise to thee, but what in thee doth live.
   Then thank him not for that which he doth say,
   Since what he owes thee, thou thyself dost pay.

SONNET 78 ALIEN PEN: So oft have I invoked thee for my Muse

So oft have I invoked thee for my Muse,
And found such fair assistance in my verse
As every alien pen hath got my use
And under thee their poesy disperse.
Thine eyes, that taught the dumb on high to sing
And heavy ignorance aloft to fly,
Have added feathers to the learned's wing
And given grace a double majesty.
Yet be most proud of that which I compile,
Whose influence is thine, and born of thee:
In others' works thou dost but mend the style,
And arts with thy sweet graces graced be;
   But thou art all my art, and dost advance
   As high as learning, my rude ignorance.

SONNET 77 MOUTHED GRAVES: Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear

Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear,
Thy dial how thy precious minutes waste;
The vacant leaves thy mind's imprint will bear,
And of this book, this learning mayst thou taste.
The wrinkles which thy glass will truly show
Of mouthed graves will give thee memory;
Thou by thy dial's shady stealth mayst know
Time's thievish progress to eternity.
Look what thy memory cannot contain,
Commit to these waste blanks, and thou shalt find
Those children nursed, delivered from thy brain,
To take a new acquaintance of thy mind.
   These offices, so oft as thou wilt look,
   Shall profit thee and much enrich thy book.

SONNET 76 COMPOUNDS STRANGE: Why is my verse so barren of new pride

Why is my verse so barren of new pride,
So far from variation or quick change?
Why with the time do I not glance aside
To new-found methods, and to compounds strange?
Why write I still all one, ever the same,
And keep invention in a noted weed,
That every word doth almost tell my name,
Showing their birth, and where they did proceed?
O! know sweet love I always write of you,
And you and love are still my argument;
So all my best is dressing old words new,
Spending again what is already spent:
   For as the sun is daily new and old,
   So is my love still telling what is told.

SONNET 81 EPITAPH: Or I shall live your epitaph to make

Or I shall live your epitaph to make,
Or you survive when I in earth am rotten,
From hence your memory death cannot take,
Although in me each part will be forgotten.
Your name from hence immortal life shall have,
Though I, once gone, to all the world must die:
The earth can yield me but a common grave,
When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie.
Your monument shall be my gentle verse,
Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read;
And tongues to be your being shall rehearse,
When all the breathers of this world are dead;
   You still shall live, such virtue hath my pen,
   Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.

SONNET 80 SAUCY BARK: O! how I faint when I of you do write

O! how I faint when I of you do write,
Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,
And in the praise thereof spends all his might,
To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame.
But since your worth, wide as the ocean is,
The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,
My saucy bark, inferior far to his,
On your broad main doth wilfully appear.
Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat,
Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride;
Or, being wracked, I am a worthless boat,
He of tall building, and of goodly pride:
   Then if he thrive and I be cast away,
   The worst was this, my love was my decay.

SONNET 115 TAN SACRED BEAUTY: Those lines that I before have writ do lie

Those lines that I before have writ do lie,
Even those that said I could not love you dearer:
Yet then my judgment knew no reason why
My most full flame should afterwards burn clearer.
But reckoning Time, whose million'd accidents
Creep in 'twixt vows, and change decrees of kings,
Tan sacred beauty, blunt the sharp'st intents,
Divert strong minds to the course of altering things;
Alas! why, fearing of Time's tyranny,
Might I not then say, 'Now I love you best,'
When I was certain o'er incertainty,
Crowning the present, doubting of the rest?
   Love is a babe, then might I not say so,
   To give full growth to that which still doth grow?

SONNET 114 MONARCH'S PLAGUE: Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you

Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you,
Drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery?
Or whether shall I say, mine eye saith true,
And that your love taught it this alchemy,
To make of monsters and things indigest
Such cherubins as your sweet self resemble,
Creating every bad a perfect best,
As fast as objects to his beams assemble?
O! 'tis the first, 'tis flattery in my seeing,
And my great mind most kingly drinks it up:
Mine eye well knows what with his gust is 'greeing,
And to his palate doth prepare the cup:
   If it be poisoned, 'tis the lesser sin
   That mine eye loves it and doth first begin.

SONNET 113 MINE EYE: Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind

Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind;
And that which governs me to go about
Doth part his function and is partly blind,
Seems seeing, but effectually is out;
For it no form delivers to the heart
Of bird, of flower, or shape which it doth latch:
Of his quick objects hath the mind no part,
Nor his own vision holds what it doth catch;
For if it see the rud'st or gentlest sight,
The most sweet favour or deformed'st creature,
The mountain or the sea, the day or night,
The crow, or dove, it shapes them to your feature.
   Incapable of more, replete with you,
   My most true mind thus maketh mine eye untrue.

SONNET 89 LAMENESS: Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault

Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault,
And I will comment upon that offence:
Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt,
Against thy reasons making no defence.
Thou canst not, love, disgrace me half so ill,
To set a form upon desired change,
As I'll myself disgrace; knowing thy will,
I will acquaintance strangle, and look strange;
Be absent from thy walks; and in my tongue
Thy sweet beloved name no more shall dwell,
Lest I, too much profane, should do it wrong,
And haply of our old acquaintance tell.
   For thee, against my self I'll vow debate,
   For I must ne'er love him whom thou dost hate.

SONNET 88 EYE OF SCORN When thou shalt be disposed to set me light

When thou shalt be disposed to set me light,
And place my merit in the eye of scorn,
Upon thy side, against myself I'll fight,
And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn.
With mine own weakness being best acquainted,
Upon thy part I can set down a story
Of faults concealed, wherein I am attainted;
That thou in losing me shalt win much glory:
And I by this will be a gainer too;
For bending all my loving thoughts on thee,
The injuries that to myself I do,
Doing thee vantage, double-vantage me.
   Such is my love, to thee I so belong,
   That for thy right, myself will bear all wrong.

SONNET 99 THE FORWARD VIOLET: 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 annexed 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.


SONNET INDEX


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Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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SONNET 98 HEAVY SATURN: From you have I been absent in the spring

From you have I been absent in the spring,
When proud pied April, dressed in all his trim,
Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing,
That heavy Saturn laughed and leapt with him.
Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell
Of different flowers in odour and in hue,
Could make me any summer's story tell,
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew:
Nor did I wonder at the lily's white,
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose;
They were but sweet, but figures of delight,
Drawn after you, you pattern of all those.
   Yet seemed it winter still, and you away,
   As with your shadow I with these did play.

SONNET INDEX


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Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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SONNET 97 FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT: How like a winter hath my absence been

How like a winter hath my absence been
From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year!
What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen!
What old December's bareness everywhere!
And yet this time removed was summer's time;
The teeming autumn, big with rich increase,
Bearing the wanton burden of the prime,
Like widow'd wombs after their lords' decease:
Yet this abundant issue seemed to me
But hope of orphans, and unfathered fruit;
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee,
And, thou away, the very birds are mute:
   Or, if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer,
   That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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SONNET 96 FINGER OF THRONED QUEEN: Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness

Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness;
Some say thy grace is youth and gentle sport;
Both grace and faults are lov'd of more and less:
Thou mak'st faults graces that to thee resort.
As on the finger of a throned queen
The basest jewel will be well esteem'd,
So are those errors that in thee are seen
To truths translated, and for true things deem'd.
How many lambs might the stern wolf betray,
If like a lamb he could his looks translate!
How many gazers mightst thou lead away,
If thou wouldst use the strength of all thy state!
   But do not so, I love thee in such sort,
   As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.



SONNET INDEX


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Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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SONNET 95 CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE: How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame

How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame
Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose,
Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name!
O! in what sweets dost thou thy sins enclose.
That tongue that tells the story of thy days,
Making lascivious comments on thy sport,
Cannot dispraise, but in a kind of praise;
Naming thy name blesses an ill report.
O! what a mansion have those vices got
Which for their habitation chose out thee,
Where beauty's veil doth cover every blot
And all things turns to fair that eyes can see!
   Take heed, dear heart, of this large privilege;
   The hardest knife ill-used doth lose his edge.


SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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SONNET 94 POWER TO HURT: 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.


SONNET INDEX


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Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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SONNET 93 EVE'S APPLE: So shall I live, supposing thou art true

So shall I live, supposing thou art true,
Like a deceived husband; so love's face
May still seem love to me, though altered new;
Thy looks with me, thy heart in other place:
For there can live no hatred in thine eye,
Therefore in that I cannot know thy change.
In many's looks, the false heart's history
Is writ in moods, and frowns, and wrinkles strange.
But heaven in thy creation did decree
That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell;
Whate'er thy thoughts, or thy heart's workings be,
Thy looks should nothing thence, but sweetness tell.
   How like Eve's apple doth thy beauty grow,
   If thy sweet virtue answer not thy show!



SONNET INDEX


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Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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SONNET 92 TERM OF LIFE: ut do thy worst to steal thyself away

But do thy worst to steal thyself away,
For term of life thou art assured mine;
And life no longer than thy love will stay,
For it depends upon that love of thine.
Then need I not to fear the worst of wrongs,
When in the least of them my life hath end.
I see a better state to me belongs
Than that which on thy humour doth depend:
Thou canst not vex me with inconstant mind,
Since that my life on thy revolt doth lie.
O what a happy title do I find,
Happy to have thy love, happy to die!
   But what's so blessed-fair that fears no blot?
   Thou mayst be false, and yet I know it not.

SONNET INDEX


Mnemonic Image 




Memory Passage 

The CROSS is dragged behind the pale HORSE for my TERM OF LIFE because I tasted EVE'S APPLE and now have the POWER TO HURT like the CANKER IN THE FRAGRANT ROSE which is shivering under the FINGER OF THE THRONED QUEEN who asks me what FREEZINGS HAVE I FELT now that HEAVY SATURN has condemned the FORWARD VIOLET.

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