Shakespeare's Sonnet 81

Or 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 entombed 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.

Either I will live to write the words for your tomb, or you will survive when I am rotting in the ground. Death cannot take away the memory of you preserved here, although everything about me will be forgotten. Through these poems your name will live forever, though once I am gone I must die to the whole world. The earth can offer me only an ordinary grave, while you will lie enshrined in people's eyes. Your monument will be my tender poetry, which eyes not yet created will read. Voices of people yet to be born will tell of your life when everyone now breathing in this world is dead. You will still live—my writing has that much power—where life breathes most fully, in people's mouths.