Question

Reread the first six lines of the sonnet. If the first line is identified as “a” in the rhyme scheme, how should the remaining lines be identified?

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,

Answer 1

1 (day) — a
2 (temperate) — b
3 (May) — a
4 (date) — b
5 (shines) — c
6 (dimm'd) — d

(So the opening follows the Shakespearean pattern abab cd...)