Sonnet 81: or I Shall Live Your Epitaph to Make
Sonnet 81: or I Shall Live Your Epitaph to Make - meaning Summary
Immortality Through Verse
The speaker assures a beloved that poetry will grant them immortality even as the poet dies. He contrasts his own mortal fate and common grave with the lasting life of the beloved's name preserved in verse. The poem presents the poet’s work as a public monument read and repeated by future generations, arguing that linguistic remembrance—"in the mouths of men"—continues the beloved’s existence beyond physical death.
Read Complete AnalysesOr 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 entombèd 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.
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