Uploaded February 2012 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
A rather sinister sonnet that has only 12 lines, rather than 14. Nobody knows why, but there's a theory that the last two lines might have identified the boy, so were kept private. Or Shakespeare might have been indicating that life could end suddenly any time. He was obsessed by death, so I prefer to believe the latter explanation.
shakespeares-sonnets.com/sonnet/126
The painting which is just for atmosphere being the only one I could find of a dead handsome youth, is The Death of Chatterton, but Henry Wallis, 1856 Thomas Chatterton was a gifted young poet who killed himself at the age of 17.
O thou, my lovely boy, who in thy power
Dost hold Time's fickle glass, his sickle, hour;
Who hast by waning grown, and therein showest
Thy lovers withering, as thy sweet self growest.
If Nature, sovereign mistress over wrack,
As thou goest onwards still will pluck thee back,
She keeps thee to this purpose, that her skill
May time disgrace and wretched minutes kill.
Yet fear her, O thou minion of her pleasure!
She may detain, but not still keep, her treasure:
Her audit (though delayed) answered must be,
And her quietus is to render thee.
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A rather sinister sonnet that has only 12 lines, rather than 14. Nobody knows why, but there's a theory that the last two lines might have identified the boy, so were kept private. Or Shakespeare might have been indicating that life could end suddenly any time. He was obsessed by death, so I prefer to believe the latter explanation.
shakespeares-sonnets.com/sonnet/126
The painting which is just for atmosphere being the only one I could find of a dead handsome youth, is The Death of Chatterton, but Henry Wallis, 1856 Thomas Chatterton was a gifted young poet who killed himself at the age of 17.
O thou, my lovely boy, who in thy power
Dost hold Time's fickle glass, his sickle, hour;
Who hast by waning grown, and therein showest
Thy lovers withering, as thy sweet self growest.
If Nature, sovereign mistress over wrack,
As thou goest onwards still will pluck thee back,
She keeps thee to this purpose, that her skill
May time disgrace and wretched minutes kill.
Yet fear her, O thou minion of her pleasure!
She may detain, but not still keep, her treasure:
Her audit (though delayed) answered must be,
And her quietus is to render thee.
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