Sonnet 108
What's in the brain that ink may character
love
constancy
repetition
age
What's in the brain that ink may character
Which hath not figured to thee my true spirit?
What's new to speak, what new to register,
That may express my love or thy dear merit?
Nothing, sweet boy; but yet, like prayers divine,
I must, each day say o'er the very same,
Counting no old thing old, thou mine, I thine,
Even as when first I hallow'd thy fair name.
So that eternal love in love's fresh case
Weighs not the dust and injury of age,
Nor gives to necessary wrinkles place,
But makes antiquity for aye his page,
Finding the first conceit of love there bred
Where time and outward form would show it dead.
What It Means
Nothing new can be written — everything that can be said about the young man has been said. But love doesn't need novelty. Old prayers are still prayers. He'll say what he's always said: 'thou mine, I thine.' Age doesn't wrinkle love. What was true at the beginning of the relationship is still true now and should be said again.
Context
Part of the Fair Youth sequence.
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