Sonnet II
When forty winters shall besiege thy brow,And dig deep trenches in thy beauty’s field,Thy youth’s proud livery so gazed on now,Will be a tatter’d weed of small worth held:Then being asked, where all thy beauty lies,Where all the treasure of thy lusty days;To say, within thine own deep sunken eyes,Were an all-eating shame, and thriftless praise.How much more praise deserv’d thy beauty’s use,If thou couldst answer ‘This fair child of mineShall sum my count, and make my old excuse,’Proving his beauty by succession thine!This were to be new made when thou art old,And see thy blood warm when thou feel’st it cold.
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- thriftless a.
- Without thrift; not prudent or prosperous in money affairs.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet II is in the public domain. This text is taken from Shakespeare's Sonnets, Project Gutenberg ebook #1041; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: William Shakespeare, Sonnet II, in The Sonnets (1609), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1041, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shakespeare-sonnets/sonnet-2.html, id L00020.
Form and metre
Sonnet II is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABABCDCDEFEFGG, the pattern of the English sonnet. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%). 96% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.0 syllables. 7% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end. Rhymes that have moved apart since the poem was written: die / memory, content / ornament, niggarding / spring, field / held, husbandry / posterity and 137 more.
See other English sonnets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABABCDCDEFEFGG browA · fieldB · nowA · heldB · liesC · daysD · eyesC · praiseD · useE · mineF · excuseE · thineF · oldG · coldG
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| When forty winters shall besiege thy brow, | 10 | ·/˘/˘·˘/·· |
| And dig deep trenches in thy beauty’s field, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Thy youth’s proud livery so gazed on now, | 10 | ···/˘˘···· |
| Will be a tatter’d weed of small worth held: | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Then being asked, where all thy beauty lies, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| Where all the treasure of thy lusty days; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| To say, within thine own deep sunken eyes, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Were an all-eating shame, and thriftless praise. | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| How much more praise deserv’d thy beauty’s use, | 10 | ····˘/·/˘· |
| If thou couldst answer ‘This fair child of mine | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Shall sum my count, and make my old excuse,’ | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Proving his beauty by succession thine! | 10 | /˘·/˘·˘/˘· |
| This were to be new made when thou art old, | 10 | ·········· |
| And see thy blood warm when thou feel’st it cold. | 10 | ·········· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.