Sonnet 17
Who will
believe
my
verse
in
time
to come
If it were
filled
with your most high
deserts
?
Which
hides
your life and shows not
half
your
parts
.
If I could write the beauty of your
eyes
.
And in fresh
numbers
number all your
graces
,
The
age
to come would say, This
poet lies
Such heavenly touches never touched
earthly
faces
.
So should my
papers
,
yellowed
with their
age
,
Be
scorned
, like
old men
of less
truth
than
tongue
,
And your true
rights
be termed a
poet's rage
And
streched
metre
of an
antique song.
������
But were some
child
of yours
alive
that
time
,
�����
� You should live
twice-- in
it and in my
rime
.
Though yet,
heaven
knows
, it is but as a
tomb
