YOUTH AND TIME WHEN I consider everything that grows Holds in perfection but a little moment, That this huge stage presenteth nought but shows Whereon the stars in secret influence comment; When I perceive that men as plants increase, Cheer'd and check'd even by the self-same sky, Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease And wear their brave state out of memory; Then the conceit of this inconstant stay And all in war with Time for love of you, COUNSELS OF LOVE UT wherefore do not you a mightier way BUT Make war upon this bloody tyrant, Time? And fortify yourself in your decay With means more blessed than my barren rhyme ? Now stand you on the top of happy hours, And many maiden gardens yet unset With virtuous wish would bear your living flowers, Much liker than your painted counterfeit : So should the lines of life that life repair, To give away yourself keeps yourself still, LOVE AS PAINTER HO will believe my verse in time to come, WHO If it were fill'd with your most high deserts? Though yet, heaven knows, it is but as a tomb Which hides your life and shows not half your parts. If I could write the beauty of your eyes The age to come would say 'This poet lies; So should my papers yellow'd with their age But were some child of yours alive that time, THE UNFADING PICTURE SHALL I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate : Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May And summer's lease hath all too short a date : Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, But thy eternal summer shall not fade Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade When in eternal lines to time thou growest : So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this ;—and this gives life to thee. THAT TIME SHOULD SPARE HIS FRIEND DEVOURING Time, blunt thou the lion's paws, And make the earth devour her own sweet brood; Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws, And burn the long-lived phoenix in her blood; Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleets, O, carve not with thy hours my Love's fair brow Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen; Him in thy course untainted do allow For beauty's pattern to succeeding men. Yet, do thy worst, old Time: despite thy wrong, My Love shall in my verse ever live young. |