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The Sonnets CIII - Alack! what poverty my Muse brings forth

By William Shakespeare

Topics: classic

Alack! what poverty my Muse brings forth,     That having such a scope to show her pride,     The argument, all bare, is of more worth     Than when it hath my added praise beside!     O! blame me not, if I no more can write!     Look in your glass, and there appears a face     That over-goes my blunt invention quite,     Dulling my lines, and doing me disgrace.     Were it not sinful then, striving to mend,     To mar the subject that before was well?     For to no other pass my verses tend     Than of your graces and your gifts to tell;     And more, much more, than in my verse can sit,     Your own glass shows you when you look in it.

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Author:William Shakespeare

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"Alack! what poverty my Muse brings forth,..." by William Shakespeare

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"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

William Shakespeare

About William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) was an English playwright and poet widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language. He wrote 154 sonnets and narrative poems including "Venus and Adonis" and "The Rape of Lucrece," alongside 37 plays that remain central to world literature.

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