Sonnet V
Those hours, that with gentle work did frameThe lovely gaze where every eye doth dwell,Will play the tyrants to the very sameAnd that unfair which fairly doth excel;For never-resting time leads summer onTo hideous winter, and confounds him there;Sap checked with frost, and lusty leaves quite gone,Beauty o’er-snowed and bareness every where:Then were not summer’s distillation left,A liquid prisoner pent in walls of glass,Beauty’s effect with beauty were bereft,Nor it, nor no remembrance what it was:But flowers distill’d, though they with winter meet,Leese but their show; their substance still lives sweet.
Words in this poem
- dwell v. i.
- To delay; to linger. [OE. dwellen, dwelien, to err, linger, AS. dwellan to deceive, hinder, delay, dwelian to err; akin to Icel. dvelja to delay, tarry, Sw. dväljas to dwell, Dan. dv]
- fairly adv.
- In a fairmanner; clearly; openly; plainly; fully; distinctly; frankly.
- bareness n.
- The state of being bare.
- pent p. p.
- Penned or shut up; confined; -- often with up. [From Pen, v. t.]
- leese v. t.
- To hurt. B. Jonson. [Cf. f. léser, L.laesus, p. p. of laedere.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet V 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 V, in The Sonnets (1609), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1041, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shakespeare-sonnets/sonnet-5.html, id L00023.
Form and metre
Sonnet V 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 88%). 96% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.0 syllables. 21% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end. Rhymes that have moved apart since the poem was written: alone / gone, alone / one.
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 frameA · dwellB · sameA · excelB · onC · thereD · goneC · whereD · leftE · glassF · bereftE · wasF · meetG · sweetG
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Those hours, that with gentle work did frame | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| The lovely gaze where every eye doth dwell, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| Will play the tyrants to the very same | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| And that unfair which fairly doth excel; | 10 | ··˘/·/˘·˘/ |
| For never-resting time leads summer on | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| To hideous winter, and confounds him there; | 10 | ·/˘/˘·˘/·· |
| Sap checked with frost, and lusty leaves quite gone, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Beauty o’er-snowed and bareness every where: | 10 | /˘···/˘/˘· |
| Then were not summer’s distillation left, | 10 | ···/˘·˘/˘· |
| A liquid prisoner pent in walls of glass, | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| Beauty’s effect with beauty were bereft, | 10 | /˘˘/·/˘·˘/ |
| Nor it, nor no remembrance what it was: | 10 | ····˘/˘··· |
| But flowers distill’d, though they with winter meet, | 10 | ·/˘/···/˘· |
| Leese but their show; their substance still lives sweet. | 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.