Sonnet 116

by  Sir William Shakespeare    

(bap. 26 April 1564; died 23 April 1616)

English poet and playwright.

 

 

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no, it is an ever-fixèd mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

 





Poetry by Editorial Team The PoetBay support member heart!
Read 891 times
Written on 2010-02-09 at 14:08

Tags Sonnet  Love  Shakespeare 

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jenks The PoetBay support member heart!
oohoo rob!
i love the cut of your gibbet :)
2010-02-09


Rob Graber
I enjoyed revisiting this famous sonnet. I do not think it is convincing; even were one to agree that love, if true, never DIES, the claim that it never even changes would remain incredible (and inconsistent, as I recall, with some of the other sonnets). In short, I am impressed once again with how much more I like the structure--due not to the Bard but to the Earl of Surrey--than the content of Shakespeare's sonnets.
2010-02-09