Shakespeare of Stratford/The Biographical Facts/Fact 24
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XXIV. JOHN WEEVER’S SONNET TO SHAKESPEARE (1599).
Sonnet addressed ‘Ad Gulielmum Shakespeare’ in Epigrams in the Oldest Cut and Newest Fashion.
Honey-tongued Shakespeare, when I saw thine issue,
I swore Apollo got them and none other;
Their rosy-tainted features, clothed in tissue,
Some heavenborn goddess said to be their mother:
Rose-cheek’d Adonis with his amber tresses,
Fair, fire-hot Venus charming him to love her,
Chaste Lucretia virgin-like her dresses,
Proud lust-stung Tarquin seeking still to prove her:
Romeo, Richard, more whose names I know not,
Their sugar’d tongues and pure attractive beauty
Say they are Saints, although that Saints they show not,
For thousands vow to them subjective duty.
They burn in love thy children. Shakespear, let them:
Go, woo thy Muse more nymphish brood beget them.
I swore Apollo got them and none other;
Their rosy-tainted features, clothed in tissue,
Some heavenborn goddess said to be their mother:
Rose-cheek’d Adonis with his amber tresses,
Fair, fire-hot Venus charming him to love her,
Chaste Lucretia virgin-like her dresses,
Proud lust-stung Tarquin seeking still to prove her:
Romeo, Richard, more whose names I know not,
Their sugar’d tongues and pure attractive beauty
Say they are Saints, although that Saints they show not,
For thousands vow to them subjective duty.
They burn in love thy children. Shakespear, let them:
Go, woo thy Muse more nymphish brood beget them.