Cento Sonnet

Pity the world, or else this glutton be,
To eat the world’s due, by the grave and thee.
This were to be new made when thou art old,
And see thy blood warm when thou feel’st it cold.

But if thou live, remember’d not to be,
Die single, and thine image dies with thee.
Thy unused beauty must be tombed with thee,
Which, used, lives th’ executor to be.

But flowers distill’d, though they with winter meet,
Leese but their show; their substance still lives sweet.
She carv’d thee for her seal, and meant thereby,
Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.

Make thee another self for love of me,
That beauty still may live in thine or thee.

. . . . .

spb