dots-menu
×

Home  »  The Oxford Book of English Verse  »  158. Sonnets xiv

Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.

William Shakespeare. 1564–1616

158. Sonnets xiv

MY love is strengthen’d, though more weak in seeming; 
I love not less, though less the show appear: 
That love is merchandised whose rich esteeming 
The owner’s tongue doth publish everywhere. 
Our love was new, and then but in the spring,         5
When I was wont to greet it with my lays; 
As Philomel in summer’s front doth sing 
And stops her pipe in growth of riper days: 
Not that the summer is less pleasant now 
Than when her mournful hymns did hush the night,  10
But that wild music burthens every bough, 
And sweets grown common lose their dear delight. 
  Therefore, like her, I sometime hold my tongue, 
  Because I would not dull you with my song.