Sonnet 64
When I have seen by Time's fell hand defacedThe rich proud cost of outworn buried age;When sometime lofty towers I see down-razedAnd brass eternal slave to mortal rage;When I have seen the hungry ocean gainAdvantage on the kingdom of the shore,And the firm soil win of the watery main,Increasing store with loss and loss with store;When I have seen such interchange of state,Or state itself confounded to decay;Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate,That Time will come and take my love away. This thought is as a death, which cannot choose But weep to have that which it fears to lose.
One more for that criminal Time, and dying, his ultimate crime.I'm fearful, forsooth,for he'll take my fair youth,but the fear makes the lovin' sublime.