Sonnet · Nature
Sonnet 67: Ah! wherefore with infection should he live
1Ah! wherefore with infection should he live,
2And with his presence grace impiety,
3That sin by him advantage should achieve,
4And lace itself with his society?
5Why should false painting imitate his cheek,
6And steel dead seeming of his living hue?
7Why should poor beauty indirectly seek
8Roses of shadow, since his rose is true?
9Why should he live, now Nature bankrupt is,
10Beggar'd of blood to blush through lively veins?
11For she hath no exchequer now but his,
12And proud of many, lives upon his gains.
13 O! him she stores, to show what wealth she had
14 In days long since, before these last so bad.
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“Sonnet 67: Ah! wherefore with infection should he live” by William Shakespeare — quilloak.com/poems/sonnet-67
Quick facts
- Poem
- Sonnet 67: Ah! wherefore with infection should he live
- Poet
- William Shakespeare
- Length
- 14 lines
- Form
- Sonnet
- Themes
- Nature, Death & Loss
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
- 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 67: Ah! wherefore with infection should he live 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 f6e71c55b4303c31…
- Editorial handling
- Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
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