So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,Īnd every fair from fair sometime declines,īy chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,Īnd summer’s lease hath all too short a date: Listen to the audio version of this Sonnet Sonnet 18 (Original Text) Sonnets 18-126 mark the growing disdain for the poet by the young person, their involvement with the mistress, and the ultimate separation of the young person, and the poet.
Sonnet 18 marks the beginning of what we can kind of describe as the second act of the sonnets. To understand the significance of this sonnet I think it needs to be known that Sonnets 1-17 are about a young person, and their beauty, as preserved by the poet through the first seventeen sonnets. Easily the most famous of Shakespeare’s Sonnets, Sonnet 18 is about as clear a love letter to someone, as well as to love itself, that you can get.
