Poem by William Shakespeare
Sonnet 6 |
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Sonnet 6 in the 1609 Quarto |
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Then let not winter’s ragged hand deface
In thee thy summer, ere thou be distill’d:
Make sweet some vial; treasure thou some place
With beauty’s treasure, ere it be self-kill’d.
That use is not forbidden usury,
Which happies those that pay the willing loan;
That’s for thyself to breed another thee,
Or ten times happier, be it ten for one;
Ten times thyself were happier than thou art,
If ten of thine ten times refigur’d thee:
Then what could death do, if thou shouldst depart,
Leaving thee living in posterity?
Be not self-will’d, for thou art much too fair
To be death’s conquest and make worms thine heir.
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—William Shakespeare[1]
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Sonnet 6 is one of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. It is a procreation sonnet within the Fair Youth sequence. The sonnet continues Sonnet 5, thus forming a diptych. It also contains the same distillatory trope featured in Sonnet 54, Sonnet 74 and Sonnet 119.[2]