Sonnet 104
“To me, fair friend, you
never can be old” —
William Shakespeare
, To me, fair friend, you never can be old, 1
For as you were when first your eye I eyed, 2
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold 3
Have from the forests shook three summers’ pride; 4
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn’d 5
In process of the seasons have I seen, 6
Three April perfumes in three hot June's burn’d, 7
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green. 8
Ah! yet doth beauty, like a dial-hand, 9
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceiv’d; 10
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand, 11
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceiv’d 12
For fear of which, hear this, Thou age unbred,- 13
Ere you were born, was beauty’s summer dead. 14
Structure:
The sonnet is in Shakespearean form and therefore contains 14 lines
It has 3 quatrains (A quatrain is a stanza which contains 4 lines)
It has a couplet (A couplet is a pair of rhyming line usually at the end
of a sonnet)
The rhyme scheme is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG
“To me, fair friend, you
never can be old” —
William Shakespeare
, To me, fair friend, you never can be old, 1
For as you were when first your eye I eyed, 2
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold 3
Have from the forests shook three summers’ pride; 4
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn’d 5
In process of the seasons have I seen, 6
Three April perfumes in three hot June's burn’d, 7
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green. 8
Ah! yet doth beauty, like a dial-hand, 9
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceiv’d; 10
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand, 11
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceiv’d 12
For fear of which, hear this, Thou age unbred,- 13
Ere you were born, was beauty’s summer dead. 14
Structure:
The sonnet is in Shakespearean form and therefore contains 14 lines
It has 3 quatrains (A quatrain is a stanza which contains 4 lines)
It has a couplet (A couplet is a pair of rhyming line usually at the end
of a sonnet)
The rhyme scheme is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG
