Shakespeare's Sonnets: Be wise as thou art cruel, do not press

Shakespeare's Sonnets: Be wise as thou art cruel, do not press

Sonnet 140

Original Text
SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS (London: G. Eld for T. T. and sold by William Aspley, 1609): i2r.
1Be wise as thou art cruel, do not press
2My tongue-tied patience with too much disdain
3Lest sorrow lend me words and words express
4The manner of my pity-wanting pain.
5If I might teach thee wit, better it were,
6Though not to love, yet love to tell me so,
7As testy sick-men when their deaths be near,
8No news but health from their physicians know.
9For if I should despair I should grow mad
10And in my madness might speak ill of thee.
11Now this ill-wresting world is grown so bad,
12Mad slanderers by mad ears believed be.
13    That I may not be so, nor thou belied,
14    Bear thine eyes straight, though thy proud heart go wide.

Notes

7] testy] irritable. Back to Line
11] ill-wresting world] a world that puts the worst face on things. Back to Line
13] belied] be lyde Q ("lied about, slandered"). Back to Line
14] go wide] see things far from how they are. Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1609
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2008
Rhyme
ababcdcdefefgg
Form
sonnet