William Shakespeare, Sonnet lxxxiii
I never saw that you did painting need,
And therefore to your fair no painting set.
I found, or thought I found, you did exceed
4
The barren tender of a poet's debt:
And therefore have I slept in your report
That you yourself, being extant, well might show
How far a modern quill doth come too short, [*]
8
Speaking of worth, what worth in you did grow.
This silence for my sin you did impute,
Which shall be most my glory, being dumb;
For I impair not beauty being mute,
12
When others would give life, and bring a tomb.
There lives more life in one of your fair eyes
Than both your poets can in praise devise.
Notes
line 7: Modern -- trite -- common. [ Back to text ]
Most notes to Shakespeare's sonnets are from Charles Knight's edition, but those in square brackets are mine.