all men are bad

Yesterday, April 23, was Shakespeare's alleged birthday and death day, and my tradition is to post a poem that is tangentially related to Shakespeare—often referencing one of the plays, as in this case—and one sonnet. Shakespeare wrote a lot of beautiful sonnets, some of which are incredible exercises in craft and poetry, and many of which are very queer and sexy. This is not really one of those.

My shoes are unpolished, my words smudged.
I come to you undressed (the lord, he whispers
Smut; that man, he whispers such). I bend
My thoughts, I submit, but a bird
Keeps flying from my mind, it slippers
My feet and sings—barren world,
I have been a little minx in it, not at all
Domestic, not at all clean, not at all blinking
At my lies. First he thought he had a wife, then
(of course) he thought he had a whore. All
I wanted (if I may speak for myself) was: more.
If only one of you had said, I hold
Your craven breaking soul, I see the pieces,
I feel them in my hands, idle silver, idle gold...
You see I cannot speak without telling what I am.
I disobey the death you gave me, love.
If you must be, then be not with me.

—Meghan O'Rourke, "Ophelia to the Court," 2010.

*

Tis better to be vile than vile esteemed
When not to be receives reproach of being,
And the just pleasures lost, which is so deemed
Not by our feeling, but by others' seeing.
For why should others' false adulterate eyes
Give salutation to my sportive blood?
Or on my frailties why are frailer spies,
Which in their wills count bad what I think good?
No, I am that I am, and they that level
At my abuses reckon up their own;
I may be straight though they themselves be bevel.
By their rank thoughts my deeds must not be shown,
Unless this general evil they maintain:
All men are bad and in their badness reign.

—William Shakespeare (1564-1616), Sonnet 121. All men are bad, thank you, Will.