Chorus:
Two households both alike in dignity,
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(In fair Verona where we lay our scene)
From ancient grudge, break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean:
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes,
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A pair of star-cross'd lovers, take their life:
Whose misadventur'd piteous overthrows,
Doth with their death bury their parents' strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,
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And the continuance of their parents' rage:
Which but their children's end nought could remove:
Is now the two hours' traffic of our Stage.
The which if you with patient ears attend,
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What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.