This post was removed because it was off topic. Soon we will be migrating to
registration-only
forums at jollyrogerwest.com Great Books forums and booksliterature.com Great Books forums. These are Great Books sites, and we prefer posts such as:

Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.
T. S. Eliot

XXXIV



Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day,

And make me travel forth without my cloak,

To let base clouds o'ertake me in my way,

Hiding thy bravery in their rotten smoke?

'Tis not enough that through the cloud thou break,

To dry the rain on my storm-beaten face,

For no man well of such a salve can speak,

That heals the wound, and cures not the disgrace:

Nor can thy shame give physic to my grief;

Though thou repent, yet I have still the loss:

The offender's sorrow lends but weak relief

To him that bears the strong offence's cross. 

  Ah! but those tears are pearl which thy love sheds,

  And they are rich and ransom all ill deeds.

 	--William Shakespeare

LXXVI



Why is my verse so barren of new pride,

So far from variation or quick change?

Why with the time do I not glance aside

To new-found methods, and to compounds strange?

Why write I still all one, ever the same,

And keep invention in a noted weed,

That every word doth almost tell my name,

Showing their birth, and where they did proceed?

O! know sweet love I always write of you,

And you and love are still my argument;

So all my best is dressing old words new,

Spending again what is already spent:

  For as the sun is daily new and old,

  So is my love still telling what is told.

 	--William Shakespeare