Sonnet 9
Is it for fear to wet a widow’s eye,
That thou consum’st thy self 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 murd’rous shame commits.
難道因為怕讓某個寡婦流淚哀哭，
你就在獨身之中讓自己白白虛度？
唉，如果沒有後代就不得不死去，
世界為你哭泣，就如喪偶的寡婦。
世界將是你的寡婦，她仍在哀哭，
哀哭未能在你死後留下你的身軀。
而別的寡婦每個都通過兒女的眼，
使她丈夫的肖像在她腦海中永駐。
看揮霍的人在世上所浪費的資財，
因世界仍享用它，隻是財權更改；
但美的浪費致使美麗在世上終結，
且留著不用，就等同於將它毀壞：
在他內心的深處沒有對別人的愛，
因他那麽可恥，竟然將自己謀害。
