Sonnet 3

Sonnet|3
Look in thy glass, and tell the face 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 thine age shall see
Despite of wrinkles this thy golden time.
But if thou live, remember'd not to be,
Die single, and thine image dies with thee.

Sonnet 3 by William Shakespeare is one of the 17 procreation sonnets urging the man to whom he is writing to his beauty by not having children. The intended recipient of this and other sonnets is a subject of scholarly debate, with some manywho believing it to be Henry Wriothesley.

The sonnet suggests that a man who does not reproduce is arrogant, and will not understand the full value of having children. The poem says the great value of reproduction is seeing the best in yourself in your child, and having a lover to share the beauty of this with.

The parting message can be seen within the last lines of the poems:

But if thou live, remember'd not to be,
Die single, and thine image dies with thee.

The rhyme scheme of the poem is that of the classic Shakespearean Sonnet with the last two stanzas having the pattern ABAB AA.

External links

* [http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/3detail.html A paraphrase of the sonnet]
* [http://www.123helpme.com/view.asp?id=8805 A brief analysis of the sonnet]
* [http://www.shakespeares-sonnets.com/iiicomm.htm Shakespeare's sonnets.com on Sonnet 3]
* [http://www.cliffsnotes.com/WileyCDA/LitNote/Shakespeare-s-Sonnets.id-169,pageNum-6.html CliffsNotes on Sonnet 3]