Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press
My tongue-tied patience with too much disdain;
Lest sorrow lend me words and words express
The manner of my pity-wanting pain.
If I might teach thee wit, better it were,
Though not to love, yet, love, to tell me so;
As testy sick men, when their deaths be near,
No news but health from their physicians know;
For if I should despair, I should grow mad,
And in my madness might speak ill of thee:
Now this ill-wresting world is grown so bad,
Mad slanderers by mad ears believed be,
That I may not be so, nor thou belied,
Bear thine eyes straight, though thy proud heart go wide.
More verses by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet 35: No More Be Grieved At That Which Thou Hast Done
- Sonnet 85: My Tongue-Tied Muse In Manners Holds Her Still
- Sonnet 89: Say That Thou Didst Forsake Me For Some Fault
- Sonnet 137: Thou Blind Fool, Love, What Dost Thou To Mine Eyes
- Sonnet 43: When Most I Wink, Then Do Mine Eyes Best See