Sonnet 17

Who will believe my verse in time to come,If it were fill'd with your most high deserts?Though yet, heaven knows, it is but as a tombWhich hides your life and shows not half your parts. 4If I could write the beauty of your eyesAnd in fresh numbers number all your graces,The age to come would say, 'This poet lies;Such heavenly touches ne'er touch'd earthly faces.' 8So should my papers, yellow'd with their age,Be scorn'd, like old men of less truth than tongue,And your true rights be term'd a poet's rageAnd stretched metre of an antique song: 12But were some child of yours alive that time,You should live twice,—in it and in my rime.

11 rage: enthusiasm12 stretched: strained, exaggerated