English poem
Sonnet 140: Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press
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 by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet 137: Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes
- Sonnet 138: When my love swears that she is made of truth
- Sonnet 139: O! call not me to justify the wrong
- Sonnet 13: O! that you were your self; but, love you are
- Sonnet 141: In faith I do not love thee with mine eyes
- Sonnet 142: Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate
- Sonnet 143: Lo, as a careful housewife runs to catch
- Sonnet 144: Two loves I have of comfort and despair