This year I struggled to find something to post about for Valentine's Day, our American holiday that's dedicated to romance. Since I'm a writer of romance, I decided that I shouldn't skip the holiday, but to definitely post a tribute to love. So, I turned to Shakespeare, that much-loved and wise master of drama and prose. Who better than Shakespeare could I quote on the topic of romance?
I found in Shakespeare's Sonnet 116 exactly what I was looking for—a tribute to the unchanging nature of true love. Let me quote it here:
"Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark, That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken. Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle’s compass come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved." Sonnet 116 by William Shakespeare