Shakespeare's Sonnets Navigator Summary of Sonnet 12 in the Table of Contents Notes for Sonnet 12

Shakespeare's Sonnet 12


  1    When I do count the clock that tells the time,
  2    And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
  3    When I behold the violet past prime,
  4    And sable curls all silver'd o'er with white;
  5    When lofty trees I see barren of leaves
  6    Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
  7    And summer's green all girded up in sheaves
  8    Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,
  9    Then of thy beauty do I question make,
 10    That thou among the wastes of time must go,
 11    Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
 12    And die as fast as they see others grow;
 13      And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
 14      Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

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