Home ⇒ 📌Sir Philip Sidney ⇒ Sonnet XXVI: Though Dusty Wits
Sonnet XXVI: Though Dusty Wits
Though dusty wits dare scorn astrology,
And fools can think those lamps of purest light
Whose numbers, ways, greatness, eternity,
Promising wonders, wonder do invite,
To have for no cause birthright in the sky,
But for to spangle the black weeds of night:
Or for some brawl, which in that chamber high,
They should still dance to please a gazer’s sight;
For me, I do Nature unidle know,
And know great causes, great effects procure:
And know those bodies high reign on the low.
And if these rules did fail, proof makes me sure,
Who oft fore-judge my after-following race,
By only those two stars in Stella’s face.
(2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
Related poetry:
- 215. Song-Hey, the Dusty Miller HEY, the dusty Miller, And his dusty coat, He will win a shilling, Or he spend a groat: Dusty was the coat, Dusty was the colour, Dusty was the kiss That I gat frae the Miller. Hey, the dusty Miller, And his dusty sack; Leeze me on the calling Fills the dusty peck: Fills the […]...
- Sonnet XXIII: The Curious Wits The curious wits seeing dull pensiveness Bewray itself in my long settled eyes, Whence those same fumes of melancholy rise, With idle pains, and missing aim, do guess. Some that know how my spring I did address, Deem that my Muse some fruit of knowledge plies: Others, because the Prince my service tries, Think that […]...
- The World feels Dusty The World feels Dusty When We stop to Die We want the Dew then Honors taste dry Flags vex a Dying face But the least Fan Stirred by a friend’s Hand Cools like the Rain Mine be the Ministry When they Thirst comes And Hybla Balms Dews of Thessaly, to fetch...
- Sonnet XXVI Lord of my love, to whom in vassalage Thy merit hath my duty strongly knit, To thee I send this written embassage, To witness duty, not to show my wit: Duty so great, which wit so poor as mine May make seem bare, in wanting words to show it, But that I hope some good […]...
- Sonnet XXVI SWeet is the Rose, but growes vpon a brere; Sweet is the Iunipere, but sharpe his bough; Sweet is the Eglantine, but pricketh nere; Sweet is the firbloome, but his braunches rough. Sweet is the Cypresse, but his rynd is tough, Sweet is the nut, but bitter is his pill; Sweet is the broome-flowre, but […]...
- Sonnet XXVI: I Ever Love To Despair I ever love where never hope appears, Yet hope draws on my never-hoping care, And my life’s hope would die, but for despair; My never-certain joy breeds ever-certain fears; Uncertain dread gives wings unto my hope, Yet my hope’s wings are laden so with fear As they cannot ascend to my hope’s sphere; […]...
- Sonnet XXVI: Where Antique Woods Where antique woods o’er-hang the mountains’s crest, And mid-day glooms in solemn silence lour; Philosophy, go seek a lonely bow’r, And waste life’s fervid noon in fancied rest. Go, where the bird of sorrow weaves her nest, Cooing, in sadness sweet, through night’s dim hour; Go, cull the dew-drops from each potent flow’r That med’cines […]...
- Translations: Dante – Inferno, Canto XXVI Florence, rejoice! For thou o’er land and sea So spread’st thy pinions that the fame of thee Hath reached no less into the depths of Hell. So noble were the five I found to dwell Therein thy sons whence shame accrues to me And no great praise is thine; but if it be That truth […]...
- Sonnet VIII: Love, Born In Greece Love, born in Greece, of late fled from his native place, Forc’d by a tedious proof, that Turkish harden’d heart Is no fit mark to pierce with his fine pointed dart, And pleas’d with our soft peace, stayed here his flying race. But finding these north climes do coldly him embrace, Not used to frozen […]...
- Before the Throne of Beauty XXVI One heavy day I ran away from the grim face of society and the dizzying clamor of the city and directed my weary step to the spacious alley. I pursued the beckoning course of the rivulet and the musical sounds of the birds until I reached a lonely spot where the flowing branches of the […]...
- Sonnet I: Loving In Truth Loving in truth, and fain in verse my love to show, That she (dear She) might take some pleasure of my pain: Pleasure might cause her read, reading might make her know, Knowledge might pity win, and pity grace obtain; I sought fit words to paint the blackest face of woe, Studying inventions fine, her […]...
- Dusty Doors CHILD of the Aztec gods, How long must we listen here, How long before we go? The dust is deep on the lintels. The dust is dark on the doors. If the dreams shake our bones, what can we say or do? Since early morning we waited. Since early, early morning, child. There must be […]...
- These are the Signs to Nature's Inns These are the Signs to Nature’s Inns Her invitation broad To Whosoever famishing To taste her mystic Bread These are the rites of Nature’s House The Hospitality That opens with an equal width To Beggar and to Bee For Sureties of her staunch Estate Her undecaying Cheer The Purple in the East is set And […]...
- Behavior BEHAVIOR-fresh, native, copious, each one for himself or herself, Nature and the Soul expressed-America and freedom expressed-In it the finest art, In it pride, cleanliness, sympathy, to have their chance, In it physique, intellect, faith-in it just as much as to manage an army or a city, or to write a book-perhaps more, The youth, […]...
- Sonnet CIX O, never say that I was false of heart, Though absence seem’d my flame to qualify. As easy might I from myself depart As from my soul, which in thy breast doth lie: That is my home of love: if I have ranged, Like him that travels I return again, Just to the time, not […]...
- Poor Poet ‘A man should write to please himself,’ He proudly said. Well, see his poems on the shelf, Dusty, unread. When he came to my shop each day, So peaked and cold, I’d sneak one of his books away And say ’twas sold. And then by chance he looked below, And saw a stack Of his […]...
- The Gardener XXVI: What Comes From Your Willing Hands “What comes from your willing Hands I take. I beg for nothing More.” “Yes, yes, I know you, modest Mendicant, you ask for all that one Has.” “If there be a stray flower for me I will wear it in my heart.” “But if there be thorns?” “I will endure them.” “Yes, yes, I know […]...
- Sonnet L LOng languishing in double malady, Of my harts wound and of my bodies greife: There came to me a leach that would apply Fit medicines for my bodies best reliefe. Vayne man (quod I) that hast but little priefe: In deep discouery of the mynds disease, Is not the hart of all the body chiefe? […]...
- Sonnet Not with vain tears, when we’re beyond the sun, We’ll beat on the substantial doors, nor tread Those dusty high-roads of the aimless dead Plaintive for Earth; but rather turn and run Down some close-covered by-way of the air, Some low sweet alley between wind and wind, Stoop under faint gleams, thread the shadows, find […]...
- Religion XXVI And an old priest said, “Speak to us of Religion.” And he said: Have I spoken this day of aught else? Is not religion all deeds and all reflection, And that which is neither deed nor reflection, but a wonder and a surprise ever springing in the soul, even while the hands hew the stone […]...
- Modern Love XXVI: Love Ere He Bleeds Love ere he bleeds, an eagle in high skies, Has earth beneath his wings: from reddened eve He views the rosy dawn. In vain they weave The fatal web below while far he flies. But when the arrow strikes him, there’s a change. He moves but in the track of his spent pain, Whose red […]...
- Sonnet 76: Why is my verse so barren of new pride? Why is my verse so barren of new pride? So far from variation or quick change? Why with the time do I not glance aside To new-found methods, and to compounds strange? Why write I still all one, ever the same, And keep invention in a noted weed, That every word doth almost tell my […]...
- Sonnet 03: Mindful Of You The Sodden Earth In Spring Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring, And all the flowers that in the springtime grow, And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing The summer through, and each departing wing, And all the nests that the bared branches show, And all winds that in […]...
- Sonnet 38 – First time he kissed me, he but only kissed First time he kissed me, he but only kissed The fingers of this hand wherewith I write; And ever since, it grew more clean and white, Slow to world-greetings, quick with its ‘Oh, list,’ When the angels speak. A ring of amethyst I could not wear here, plainer to my sight, Than that first kiss. […]...
- Sonnet XCI Some glory in their birth, some in their skill, Some in their wealth, some in their bodies’ force, Some in their garments, though new-fangled ill, Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse; And every humour hath his adjunct pleasure, Wherein it finds a joy above the rest: But these particulars are not […]...
- Sonnet III THe souerayne beauty which I doo admyre, Witnesse the world how worthy to be prayzed: The light wherof hath kindled heauenly iyre, In my fraile spirit by her from basenesse raysed. That being now with her huge brightnesse dazed, Base thing I can no more endure to view: But looking still on her I stand […]...
- Sonnet XIII I fancied, while you stood conversing there, Superb, in every attitude a queen, Her ermine thus Boadicea bare, So moved amid the multitude Faustine. My life, whose whole religion Beauty is, Be charged with sin if ever before yours A lesser feeling crossed my mind than his Who owning grandeur marvels and adores. Nay, rather […]...
- Sonnet IV Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Upon thyself thy beauty’s legacy? Nature’s bequest gives nothing but doth lend, And being frank she lends to those are free. Then, beauteous niggard, why dost thou abuse The bounteous largess given thee to give? Profitless usurer, why dost thou use So great a sum of sums, yet canst […]...
- To Astronomers Prate not to me so much of suns and of nebulous bodies; Think ye Nature but great, in that she gives thee to count? Though your object may be the sublimest that space holds within it, Yet, my good friends, the sublime dwells not in the regions of space....
- WINTERLIGHT Let us, this December night, leave the ring Of heat, the lapping flames around the fire’s heart, Move with bodies tensed against the light Towards the moon’s pull and the cloud’s hand. Arms of angels hold us, lend our bodies Height of stars and the planets’ whirl, Grant us sufficiency of light so we may […]...
- Sonnet LXVI: The Night-Flood Rakes The night-flood rakes upon the stony shore; Along the rugged cliffs and chalky caves Mourns the hoarse Ocean, seeming to deplore All that are buried in his restless waves- Mined by corrosive tides, the hollow rock Falls prone, and rushing from its turfy height, Shakes the broad beach with long-resounding shock, Loud thundering on the […]...
- Sonnet IV: Unthrifty Loveliness, Why Dost Thou Spend Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Upon thy self thy beauty’s legacy? Nature’s bequest gives nothing, but doth lend, And being frank she lends to those are free: Then, beauteous niggard, why dost thou abuse The bounteous largess given thee to give? Profitless usurer, why dost thou use So great a sum of sums, yet […]...
- Sonnet XVII Who will believe my verse in time to come, If it were fill’d with your most high deserts? Though yet, heaven knows, it is but as a tomb Which hides your life and shows not half your parts. If I could write the beauty of your eyes And in fresh numbers number all your graces, […]...
- Sonnet 17: Who will believe my verse in time to come Who will believe my verse in time to come If it were filled with your most high deserts? Though yet heaven knows it is but as a tomb Which hides your life, and shows not half your parts: If I could write the beauty of your eyes, And in fresh numbers number all your graces, […]...
- Sonnet 4: Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Upon thy self thy beauty’s legacy? Nature’s bequest gives nothing, but doth lend, And being frank she lends to those are free. Then, beauteous niggard why dost thou abuse, The bounteous largess given thee to give? Profitless usurer, why dost thou use So great a sum of sums yet […]...
- Sonnet XXXV: Some, Misbelieving To Miracle Some, misbelieving and profane in love, When I do speak of miracles by thee, May say, that thou art flattered by me, Who only write my skill in verse to prove. See miracles, ye unbelieving, see A dumb-born Muse made t’express the mind, A cripple hand to write, yet lame by kind, One […]...
- Sonnet LXXXVI Was it the proud full sail of his great verse, Bound for the prize of all too precious you, That did my ripe thoughts in my brain inhearse, Making their tomb the womb wherein they grew? Was it his spirit, by spirits taught to write Above a mortal pitch, that struck me dead? No, neither […]...
- 395. Sonnet on the Author's Birthday SING on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough, Sing on, sweet bird, I listen to thy strain, See aged Winter, ‘mid his surly reign, At thy blythe carol, clears his furrowed brow. So in lone Poverty’s dominion drear, Sits meek Content with light, unanxious heart; Welcomes the rapid moments, bids them part, Nor asks if […]...
- Sonnet 86: Was it the proud full sail of his great verse Was it the proud full sail of his great verse, Bound for the prize of all-too-precious you, That did my ripe thoughts in my brain inhearse, Making their tomb the womb wherein they grew? Was it his spirit, by spirits taught to write Above a mortal pitch, that struck me dead? No, neither he, nor […]...
- Holy Sonnet V: I Am A Little World Made Cunningly I am a little world made cunningly Of elements, and an angelic sprite; But black sin hath betrayed to endless night My worlds both parts, and (oh!) both parts must die. You which beyond that heaven which was most high Have found new spheres, and of new lands can write, Pour new seas in mine […]...