Sonnet 9

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Sonnet 9 by William Shakespeare Is it for fear to wet a widow's eye That thou consumest thyself in single life? Ah! if thou issueless shalt hap to die. The world will wail thee, like a makeless wife; The world will be thy widow and still weep That thou no form of thee hast left behind, When every private widow well may keep By children's eyes her husband's shape in mind. Look, what an unthrift in the world doth spend Shifts but his place, for still the world enjoys it; But beauty's waste hath in the world an end, And kept unused, the user so destroys it. No love toward others in that bosom sits That on himself such murderous shame commits.

[edit] Synopsis

Sonnet 9 is another of Shakespeare's procreation sonnets. In it, he reasons that if the young man remains single so that he does not make a widow, he is wrong because if he dies the entire world will in effect be a widow, crying over the fact that he did not leave a child behind, or a copy of his beauty. To Shakespeare, a widow will always have the image of her children to console her after her loss.

Ah! if thou issueless shalt hap to die.

The world will wail thee, like a makeless wife;

The world will be thy widow and still weep

That thou no form of thee hast left behind,

When every private widow well may keep

By children's eyes her husband's shape in mind.

The sonnet ends with a scathing declaration that if the young man does not marry and have children, he is committing "murderous shame" upon himself.

No love toward others in that bosom sits

That on himself such murderous shame commits.

[edit] See also

Shakespeare's sonnets

[edit] External links

• Analysis of the sonnet
• CliffsNotes on the sonnet
• Paraphrase of the sonnet