Sonnet · Love
Sonnet 137: Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes
1Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes,
2That they behold, and see not what they see?
3They know what beauty is, see where it lies,
4Yet what the best is take the worst to be.
5If eyes, corrupt by over-partial looks,
6Be anchor'd in the bay where all men ride,
7Why of eyes' falsehood hast thou forged hooks,
8Whereto the judgment of my heart is tied?
9Why should my heart think that a several plot,
10Which my heart knows the wide world's common place?
11Or mine eyes, seeing this, say this is not,
12To put fair truth upon so foul a face?
13 In things right true my heart and eyes have err'd,
14 And to this false plague are they now transferr'd.
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“Sonnet 137: Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes” by William Shakespeare — quilloak.com/poems/sonnet-137
Quick facts
- Poem
- Sonnet 137: Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes
- Poet
- William Shakespeare
- Length
- 14 lines
- Form
- Sonnet
- Themes
- Love
Craft notes
How this poem works
Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.
- Shape
- 14 lines · one 14-line stanza
- End rhyme
- ABABCDCDEFEFGH — a near-Shakespearean sonnet scheme.
- Line length
- Mostly 10-syllable lines (pentameter length).
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Text, source & rights
A traceable edition
Full-text display is based on the committed source record and a United States term-expiry review.
- Author record
- William Shakespeare1564–1616
- Source record
- PoetryDBSonnet 137: Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes by william-shakespeare, PoetryDB transcription
- Display decision
- Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
- Publication record
- Not recorded in the imported source
- Text fingerprint
- SHA-256 13f289eb042f8b9b…
- Editorial handling
- Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
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