Sonnet 145

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Sonnet 145 in the 1609 Quarto
Q1 Q2 Q3 C Those lips that Love’s own hand did make Breath’d forth the sound that said “I hate,” To me that languish’d for her sake: But when she saw my woeful state, Straight in her heart did mercy come, Chiding that tongue that ever sweet Was used in giving gentle doom; And taught it thus anew to greet; “I hate” she alter’d with an end, That follow’d it as gentle day Doth follow night, who, like a fiend, From heaven to hell is flown away; “I hate” from hate away she threw, And sav’d my life, saying “not you.” 4 8 12 14 —William Shakespeare[1]

Sonnet 145 is one of Shakespeare's sonnets. It forms part of the Dark Lady sequence of sonnets and is the only one written not in iambic pentameter, but instead tetrameter. It is also the Shakespeare sonnet which uses the fewest letters. It is written as a description of the feelings of a man who is so in love with a woman that hearing her say that "she hates" something immediately creates a fear that she is referring to him. But then when she notices how much pain she has caused her lover by saying that she may potentially hate him, she changes the way that she says it to assure him that she hates but does not hate him.