Sonnet 118

Like as, to make our appetites more keen,

With eager compounds we our palate urge,

As, to prevent our maladies unseen,

We sicken to shun sickness when we purge,

Even so, being full of your ne’er-cloying sweetness,

To bitter sauces did I frame my feeding

And, sick of welfare, found a kind of meetness

To be diseased ere that there was true needing.

Thus policy in love, t’ anticipate

The ills that were not, grew to faults assurèd,

And brought to medicine a healthful state

Which, rank of goodness, would by ill be curèd.

But thence I learn, and find the lesson true,

Drugs poison him that so fell sick of you.

Just as we fast

To stimulate our appetite

Or tie ourselves to the mast

To gain power over the sirens’ might

Or take a little of this small drug

To avoid doing something harder,

So I thought it wise, so as not to fatigue

In passion for you or ardor,

To draw away from your sweetness

To taste a more sour fruit

To guard against possible weakness

By straying somewhat into it.

I learned rather quickly it was a mistake

To seek from you any of that sort of break.