LXXXIOr I shall live your epitaph to make,Or you survive when I in earth am rotten;From hence your memory death cannot take,Although in me each part will be forgotten.Your name from hence immortal life shall have,Though I, once gone, to all the world must die:The earth can yield me but a common grave,When you entombed in men’s eyes shall lie.Your monument shall be my gentle verse,Which eyes not yet created shall o’er-read;And tongues to be, your being shall rehearse,When all the breathers of this world are dead;You still shall live, such virtue hath my pen,Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.
Or I shall live your epitaph to make,Or you survive when I in earth am rotten;From hence your memory death cannot take,Although in me each part will be forgotten.Your name from hence immortal life shall have,Though I, once gone, to all the world must die:The earth can yield me but a common grave,When you entombed in men’s eyes shall lie.Your monument shall be my gentle verse,Which eyes not yet created shall o’er-read;And tongues to be, your being shall rehearse,When all the breathers of this world are dead;You still shall live, such virtue hath my pen,Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.