Sonnet Ccxxix:

This is a sorry ending to a thing We once called love, in our fatuity, Boasting that nothing worthier could be, Beyond the limit of its charmed ring! Was it for this I set myself to sing, Not as a poet, as a devotee; Making a marvel of what others see As common stuff, through my imagining? Today I saw thee, blushing at thy name, Stealing from shadow unto shadow, spread, Like mercy's pall, around thy lustrous head; And all thy praise was blurred with one great blame, And all thy beauty was a snare to dread, And all of love that lasted was its shame.