Look in thy glass, and tell the faces thou viewest (Sonnet 3)
Look in thy glass, and tell the faces thou viewest
Now is the time that face should form another;
Whose fresh repair if now thou not renewest,
Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother.
For where is she so fair whose unear’d womb
Disdains the tillage of thy husbandry?
Or who is he so fond will be the tomb
Of his self-love, to stop posterity?
Thou art thy mother’s glass, and she in thee
Calls back the lovely April of her prime:
So thou through windows of thing age shalt see
Despite of wrinkles this thy golden time.
But if thou live, remember’d not to be,
Die single, and thing image dies with thee.
Credit
This poem is in the public domain.
Date Published
01/01/1904