Shakespeare's Sonnet 54

O! how much more doth beauty beauteous seemBy that sweet ornament which truth doth give.The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deemFor that sweet odour, which doth in it live.The canker blooms have full as deep a dyeAs the perfumed tincture of the roses.Hang on such thorns, and play as wantonlyWhen summer’s breath their masked buds discloses:But, for their virtue only is their show,They live unwoo’d, and unrespected fade;Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not so;Of their sweet deaths, are sweetest odours made:And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth,When that shall vade, by verse distills your truth.

How much more beautiful beauty seems when it has the sweet addition of inner truth. A rose looks lovely, but we think it lovelier because of the sweet scent that lives within it. Wild roses have colors just as deep as those of fragrant roses. They grow on similar thorny branches and dance just as freely when summer’s breath opens their covered buds. But because their only merit is their appearance, they live without being sought out and fade without being valued. They die leaving nothing behind. Sweet roses do not: their fragrant deaths produce the sweetest perfumes. And so it is with you, beautiful and lovely young man. When your beauty fades, my poetry will preserve the essence of your inner truth.