POEM #4 MEMORIZED

1024. I went with Sonnet LXV because I couldn't make up my mind and because it's so like and unlike Keat's Grecian Urn, and who doesn't like a little lack of variety every now and then? It's not the prettiest, wittiest, sweetest, cleverest or profoundest of the sonnets by half imho, but it's number sixty-five, and it was printed in black ink...or pixels...and technically the text on this page is dark shade of gray...so phooey to the naysayer. You've got to start somewhere. If on the off-chance I were self-absorbed, I would point out that, on the basis of Grecian Urn and this, I have a problem with mortality. Or else I like history and memory. Or else I don't have problem w/ mortality, but appreciate the extra-temporal qualities in Grecian Urn and LXV. Lucky I'm not self-absorbed. Ecco il sonetto: 

     Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, 

     But sad mortality o'ersways their power,

     How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, 

     Whose action is no stronger than a flower? 

     O! how shall summer's honey breath hold out, 

      Against the wrackful siege of battering days,

      When rocks impregnable are not so stout,

      Nor gates of steel so strong but Time decays?

      O fearful meditation! where, alack,

      Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid?

      Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back?

      Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?

          O! none, unless this miracle have might, 

         That in black ink my love may still shine bright.