Sonnet 29

William Shakespeare · 1609

Catalog grade guidance: 9–12 — English sonnet; dense metaphor—best with notes for younger high-school readers.

15 content lines · 123 words · Est. recitation about 1 min 8 sec (approx.)

Public-domain text for reading and recitation practice. Source: Project Gutenberg eBook #1041, Shakespeare's Sonnets.Estimated time uses ~120 words/minute plus short pauses—not a contest rule.

XXIX

When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featur’d like him, like him with friends possess’d,
Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven’s gate;
    For thy sweet love remember’d such wealth brings
    That then I scorn to change my state with kings.