Sonnet 25
Let those who are in favour with their stars,
Of public honour and proud titles boast,
Whilst I whom fortune of such triumph bars
Unlooked for joy in that I honour most;
Great princes’ favourites their fair leaves spread,
But as the marigold at the sun’s eye,
And in themselves their pride lies buried,
For at a frown they in their glory die.
The painful warrior famoused for worth,
After a thousand victories once foiled,
Is from the book of honour razed quite,
And all the rest forgot for which he toiled:
Then happy I that love and am beloved
Where I may not remove nor be removed.
July 15th, 2006 at 8:20 am
Dear Some Guy,
I once had a teacher of Poetry in NYC named WIlliam Packard. He said, ‘there’s probably no better wall to bang your head against than Shakespeare’s poetry’. Then again James Joyce said, ‘Shakespeare’s Sonnets are for those who have lost the balance of their minds’.
i lost my mind and found (or thought I found) it back in these sonnets. I love your words saying, ‘I read this twenty times, checked out several books and i still don’t get it’. That’s exactly my same experience. Though as i live and breathe these poems they are now becoming very clear.
Anyways, i’m glad to have found your contribution to sanity or insanity, as you like it.
yours,
W.S.