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Muse SONNET NO. 108         What's in the brain that ink may character,       Which hath not figured to thee my true spirit       What's now to speak, what's now to register       That may express my love or thy dear merit?       Nothing-sweet boy but yet like prayers divine       I must each day say o'er the very same       Counting no old thing old, thou mine, I thine.       Even as when first I hallow'd thy fair name       So that eternal love in loves fresh case       Weigh's not the dust and injury of age,       Nor gives to necessary wrinkles place,       But makes antiquity for aye his page       Finding the first conceit of love there bred       Where time and outward form would show it dead.

• 
  This sonnet is addressed by Bacon to " my true spirit", his
  poetic muse-love.  The   "sweet boy" referred to in the
  fourth line is clearly " cupid ", the Roman love god.  Here the
  poet writes that there is nothing in the brain that ink(writing)
  may not character (put in writing) and figure (illustrate).  To
  the reader the true spirit of the poet.  What can he speak and
  what can he register (record) to express his love for his poetic
  muse.
  
   

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