Sonnet LXXXV
My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still,While comments of your praise richly compil’d,Reserve their character with golden quill,And precious phrase by all the Muses fil’d.I think good thoughts, whilst others write good words,And like unlettered clerk still cry ‘Amen’To every hymn that able spirit affords,In polish’d form of well-refined pen.Hearing you praised, I say ‘’tis so, ’tis true,’And to the most of praise add something more;But that is in my thought, whose love to you,Though words come hindmost, holds his rank before.Then others, for the breath of words respect,Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect.
Words in this poem
- clerk n.
- A clergyman or ecclesiastic. [Either OF. clerc, fr. L. clericus a priest, or AS. clerc, cleric, clerk, priest, fr. L. clericus, fr. Gr. Clergy.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet LXXXV 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 LXXXV, in The Sonnets (1609), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1041, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shakespeare-sonnets/sonnet-85.html, id L00103.
Form and metre
Sonnet LXXXV 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 89%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.0 syllables.
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 stillA · compil'dB · quillA · fil'dB · wordsC · amenD · affordsC · penD · trueE · moreF · youE · beforeF · respectG · effectG
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 |
|---|---|---|
| My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| While comments of your praise richly compil’d, | 10 | ·/˘···/˘˘/ |
| Reserve their character with golden quill, | 10 | ˘/·/˘˘·/˘· |
| And precious phrase by all the Muses fil’d. | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| I think good thoughts, whilst others write good words, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| And like unlettered clerk still cry ‘Amen’ | 10 | ········˘/ |
| To every hymn that able spirit affords, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘/ |
| In polish’d form of well-refined pen. | 10 | ·/˘···˘/˘· |
| Hearing you praised, I say ‘’tis so, ’tis true,’ | 10 | /˘········ |
| And to the most of praise add something more; | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| But that is in my thought, whose love to you, | 10 | ·········· |
| Though words come hindmost, holds his rank before. | 10 | ·········· |
| Then others, for the breath of words respect, | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect. | 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.