How can I lack a subject to write about
While you are breathing, you who pour into my poetry
Your own sweet praise, which is too excellent
To be repeated on every common piece of paper.
Oh, give yourself the credit, if anything in me
Worthy of reading survives your looking at it.
For who is so stupid that they can't write to you,
When you yourself give light to all invention?
You are the tenth muse, ten times worthier
Than the old nine muses that other rhymers call upon,
And whoever calls on you, let him give birth to
Everlasting verses that will outlive a long life.
If my small muse pleases this demanding age,
The pain of writing will be mine, but the acclaim will be yours.