O, how much more doth beauty
beauteous seem
By that sweet ornament which truth doth
give!
The rose looks fair, but fairer we it
deem
For that sweet odour which doth in it
live.
The canker-blooms have full as deep a
dye
As the perfumed tincture of the roses,
Hang on such thorns and play as wantonly
When summer's breath their masked buds
discloses:
But, for their virtue only is their
show,
They live unwoo'd and unrespected fade,
Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not
so;
Of their sweet deaths are sweetest
odours made:
And so of you, beauteous and lovely
youth,
When that shall fade, my verse
distills your truth.
View all
Shakespeare's Sonnets:
