Page:Shakespeare's Sonnets (1923) Yale.djvu/74

64 

In the old age black was not counted fair,

Or if it were, it bore not beauty's name;

But now is black beauty's successive heir,

And beauty slander'd with a bastard's shame:

For since each hand hath put on Nature's power,

Fairing the foul with Art's false borrow'd face,

Sweet beauty hath no name, no holy bower,

But is profan'd, if not lives in disgrace.

Therefore my mistress' brows are raven black,

Her eyes so suited, and they mourners seem

At such who, not born fair, no beauty lack,

Sland'ring creation with a false esteem:

Yet so they mourn, becoming of their woe,

That every tongue says beauty should look so.

 

How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st,

Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds

With thy sweet fingers, when thou gently sway'st

The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,

Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap

To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,

Whilst my poor lips, which should that harvest reap,

At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand!

To be so tickl'd, they would change their state

And situation with those dancing chips,

O'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait,

Making dead wood more bless'd than living lips.

Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,

Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.

 1–14 Cf. n.

1 black fair; cf. n.

3 successive: legitimate

6 Fairing face: beautifying ugliness by cosmetics

10 suited: attired

11 no beauty lack: make themselves beautiful by artifice

13 so: in such a manner

becoming of: gracing  4 wiry concord: harmony of the wires

5 jacks; cf. n. 