The day of masterpieces :)

A sparkling gem of a famous sonnet on this übercold morning  J

_________________________________________

CXXIX

  The expense of spirit in a waste of shame

  Is lust in action: and till action, lust

  Is perjur'd, murderous, bloody, full of blame,

  Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;

  Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight;

  Past reason hunted; and no sooner had,

  Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait,

  On purpose laid to make the taker mad:

  Mad in pursuit and in possession so;

  Had, having, and in quest, to have extreme;

  A bliss in proof,-- and prov'd, a very woe;

  Before, a joy propos'd; behind a dream.

    All this the world well knows; yet none knows well

    To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.

_________________________________________

I won’t write much, because much has already been written on this one  J  but note the patterned enjambement in lines 1, 2, and 13 enveloping the end-stopped lines of the rest of the poem.  The volta is the yet in the penultimate line, and the point is driven home by the antonym pair heaven/hell in the final line.  An even more famous sonnet in the afternoon  J