Shakespeare - Poetry

The sixteenth poem in the book is a sonnet from William Shakespeare.  Sonnet 18, for those keeping score at home.

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

I like it.  I mean, that isn't surprising that I like it.  Shakespeare is one of the greatest poets in English history and I've already gushed about him in the past.  This is probably his most well known sonnet, but I prefer #130, the one that begins, 'My mistress eyes are nothing like the sun...'.
In this one, Shakespeare begins by finding a near perfect thing, a summer day, and comparing his love to it.  Or rather, he makes the comparison and immediately discards it.  His love is better than that and he goes on to list why that is.  The point that sticks with me is that no matter how good summer is, the year keeps going. Those warm golden days eventually turn to cold winter.
The last six lines are particularly interesting when you reflect that we really don't know to whom the poem is written.  Most scholars believe it is written towards a man, though there is some question as to whether Shakespeare is writing about his romantic attraction to the man or if he is writing for someone else.  In any case, the beauty and virtue of the subject most assuredly did not outlive the death.  The beauty of this sonnet far, far overshadowed him.