Sonnet XVIII: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?

Shakespeare, William (1564 - 1616)

Original Text

William Shakespeare, Shake-speares sonnets (London: G. Eld for T. T., 1609). STC 22353. Facs. edn.: London: J. Cape, 1925. PR 2750 B48 1609b ROBA.

1Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

2Thou art more lovely and more temperate.

3Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

4And summer's lease hath all too short a date.

5Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

6And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

7And every fair from fair sometime declines,

8By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;

9But thy eternal summer shall not fade

10Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;

11Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,

12When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:

13So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

14So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Notes

4] date: duration, period. Back to Line

7] fair: beauty. Back to Line

8] untrimm'd: stripped of its ornament. Back to Line

10] ow'st: "own'st," possessest. Back to Line

Publication Start Year

1609

RPO poem Editors

F. D. Hoeniger

RPO Edition

3RP 1.138.

Rhyme

ababcdcdefefgg

Form

sonnet