Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SONNET: 46, by GEORGE SANTAYANA


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SONNET: 46, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: When I survey the harvest of the year
Last Line: How beauty can be true and virtue fair.
Subject(s): Beauty; Virtue


When I survey the harvest of the year
And from time's threshing garner up the grain,
What profit have I of forgotten pain,
What comfort, heart-locked, for the winter's cheer?
The season's yield is this, that thou art dear,
And that I love thee, that is all my gain;
The rest was chaff, blown from the weary brain
Where now thy treasured image lieth clear.
How liberal is beauty that, but seen,
Makes rich the bosom of her silent lover!
How excellent is truth, on which I lean!
Yet my religion were a charmed despair,
Did I not in thy perfect heart discover
How beauty can be true and virtue fair.





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