Sonnet 116

Written by Shakespeare


Adapted by Alison King as a UDL demonstration project for a Virtual Classroom

Painting of William Shakespeare

Two hearts together

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments.


Oak tree

Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:


Lighthouse in rough water

O no; it is an ever-fixed mark, 
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;


Star guiding a ship at night

It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.


Dead Rose

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 
Within his bending sickle's compass come; 


Night with dead trees

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.


If this be error and upon me proved,
   I never writ, nor no man ever loved.