Shakespeare's Sonnets: Or I shall live your epitaph to make

Shakespeare's Sonnets: Or I shall live your epitaph to make

Sonnet 81

Original Text
SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS (London: G. Eld for T. T. and sold by William Aspley, 1609): f1v.
3From hence your memory death cannot take,
4Although in me each part will be forgotten.
5Your name from hence immortal life shall have,
6Though I (once gone) to all the world must die.
8When you entombèd in men's eyes shall lie,
9Your monument shall be my gentle verse,
10Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read,
11And tongues to be, your being shall rehearse.
12When all the breathers of this world are dead,
13    You still shall live (such virtue hath my pen)

Notes

1] Or] either. Back to Line
2] Extrametrical, like line 4. Back to Line
7] common grave] general burial ground. Back to Line
14] ev'n] euen Q. Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1609
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2008
Form