Thursday extracts: An anniversary

Thursday Extracts is a year old (Well it will be on Saturday. But I can't do it then or it would be a Saturday Extract, wouldn't it?) I wanted to post something about anniversaries, but all the poems I can find seem to be about sad things. And all the prose extracts are about Christmas (which isn't really suitable for midsummer, is it?)

So I turned to Shakespeare, who I assumed would have something to say on the subject of years and time. 
Here's Sonnet XII:

When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls all silver'd o'er with white;
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,
Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow;
And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.