ISonnet · 1609

From fairest creatures we desire increase,

That thereby beauty’s rose might never die,

by William Shakespeare

From fairest creatures we desire increase

Passage 1 of 7From fairest creatures we desire increaseRadiant · Love

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COMPLETE POEMI

From fairest creatures we desire increase

William Shakespeare · 1609

01From fairest creatures we desire increase,

02That thereby beauty’s rose might never die,

03But as the riper should by time decease,

04His tender heir might bear his memory:

05But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes,

06Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial fuel,

07Making a famine where abundance lies,

08Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel:

09Thou that art now the world’s fresh ornament,

10And only herald to the gaudy spring,

11Within thine own bud buriest thy content,

12And tender churl mak’st waste in niggarding:

13Pity the world, or else this glutton be,

14To eat the world’s due, by the grave and thee.

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From fairest creatures we desire increase

When forty winters shall besiege thy brow

Look in thy glass and tell the face thou viewest

Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend

Those hours, that with gentle work did frame

Then let not winter’s ragged hand deface

Lo! in the orient when the gracious light

Music to hear, why hear’st thou music sadly

Is it for fear to wet a widow’s eye

For shame! deny that thou bear’st love to any

As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow’st

When I do count the clock that tells the time

O! that you were your self; but, love you are

Not from the stars do I my judgement pluck

When I consider everything that grows

But wherefore do not you a mightier way

Who will believe my verse in time to come

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day

Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion’s paws

A woman’s face with nature’s own hand painted

So is it not with me as with that Muse

My glass shall not persuade me I am old

As an unperfect actor on the stage

Mine eye hath play’d the painter and hath stell’d

Let those who are in favour with their stars

Lord of my love, to whom in vassalage

Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed

How can I then return in happy plight

When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought

Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts

If thou survive my well-contented day

Full many a glorious morning have I seen

Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day

No more be griev’d at that which thou hast done

Let me confess that we two must be twain

As a decrepit father takes delight

How can my Muse want subject to invent

O! how thy worth with manners may I sing

Take all my loves, my love, yea take them all

Those pretty wrongs that liberty commits

That thou hast her it is not all my grief

When most I wink, then do mine eyes best see

If the dull substance of my flesh were thought

The other two, slight air, and purging fire

The Tyger

“Hope” is the thing with feathers

A Red, Red Rose

The Passionate Shepherd to His Love

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

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