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…

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…

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…

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…

So are you to my thoughts as food to life, Or as sweet-season’d showers are to the ground; And for the peace of you I hold such strife As ‘twixt…

Whilst I alone did call upon thy aid, My verse alone had all thy gentle grace, But now my gracious numbers are decay’d And my sick Muse doth give another…

But be contented: when that fell arrest Without all bail shall carry me away, My life hath in this line some interest, Which for memorial still with thee shall stay.…

That time of year thou mayst in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruin’d choirs, where…

O, lest the world should task you to recite What merit lived in me, that you should love After my death, dear love, forget me quite, For you in me…

No longer mourn for me when I am dead Then you shall hear the surly sullen bell Give warning to the world that I am fled From this vile world,…