Sonnet CCLXXIV

There’s never greater disappointment than the sun,
meandering, intense and sinister, to you.
You know these curtains whisper in the night, untrue,
exalting in their strange conspiracy of fun.
The sheets are mocking you, awash with yellow dun,
untruthful flattery, so calmly clean and new.
The ceiling’s laughing: crowded frescoes flame your rue,
their stellar constellations pointed as a gun.

There’s never greater disappointment as you turn
and know you must wake up to face your world of spurn.

Go to your windowsill; uncover all the panes.
Regard the light azure with caution – gingerly!
Again you must live under it, and swim its sea,
and move and speak and laugh, and face the world’s disdain.

Sonnet CCLXXIII

Of late, she thinks about herself and how she’s changed.
She’s old, dependent, dying, trapped within her home.
She planned on travelling, to Paris, Cuba, Rome,
but now she lives off pensions, locked inside her cage.
She thinks of youth, and misses it, a bit amazed
at how the time has passed. Her only son is grown –
but stingy – keeping phone calls, money for his own,
while thinking she’s decrepit and deranged.

Her son would never spend a measly dime for her
despite his wealth. She’s raised him all these years, to err!

And yet – to err is only human. What of that?
Forgiveness is divine! If sons decide to scorn,
then who’ll coerce their smiles, forced and falsely warm?
An honest miser’s better than a lying rat.

Sonnet CCLXXII

Momentous, momentary pleasure must secede
to watching weight, so equally as selfish though
a lot less fun; an effort spent with foolish Woe.
How difficult and ravenous the task must be
when such delicious Turkey crowns the Festive Feast!
One smiles, sipping wine, and all the while knows
the foul fowl lights the Greed within the bowel,
a ghastly, menacing, and dangerous Disease.

One smacks their lips, a wolf delighted with their Hare;
but truly, is it hare or Wolf that’s now ensnared?

A-rumbling in the antechamber of the gut,
a trembling Fire burns, the inkling of Desire.
One takes the fork and grabs a bite as now the pyre
alights, ignites, and rages like a dirty Smut.

Sonnet CCLXXI

Curvaceous hips and comely bosom, virgin smile,
with hazel eyes of gloating satisfaction’s glaze.
And hers embraced his eyes, abashed and full of praise,
exalting her, subjected to her nude beguile.

His mind was hers, commanded by her cunning wile;
his feet, two frozen pillars; eyes and brain, ablaze;
and all this time she waits and like a lion, plays,
manipulating him like worthless clay now worth her while.

The crowd moves on, a patter on the marble floor
to fresher art, abandoning the brazen whore.

And lest he be removed from all the blatant rest,
he saunters on, uprooting from his rude desire.
The whore remains, a frozen painting made of fire,
the temptress drawing newer victims to her breast.

Sonnet CCLXX

My mind is partly put at fault for arson’s crime,
although the world provides the fuel and grime.

Sequestered in a quiet room, the world’s alight:
surrounding winds destroy the silence with their games
and thoughts ignite my barren walls with tarnished flames.
My windows bring the sun in, seat him at my right,
his bars of light as gracious as a gentle dame’s.
My pencil flying, unaware, preparing, aims,
then picks the marks and sends me soaring, off to write.

Sprayed on the page, one never sees the criminal;
the Inspiration’s hidden; so’s Identity.
Perhaps the only thing you’ll see is memory,
collected here, a souvenir of short ago.

Sonnet CCLXIX

The awning seemed like fire, flapping in the breeze:
a palish beige flickering and whipping hot,
there perched upon a small gazebo’s wooden lot.
If only I were not infirm of strength, so weak!
To be that awning – how resiliently neat,
aflame with strange desire, burning smartly raw,
established on a vantage point aloof, afar,
a kingly simpleton, so crude, yet full of ease!

No water puts it out; no wind detracts its flare;
and only change of season – change of taste – may dare.

An instant, flapping in the autumn, in the fall,
now in the winter, flapping on the wooden beams.
Who dares remove such strange and fierce audacity,
combating flames with insolence and naughty gall?

Sonnet CCLXVIII

I find the world today requires desperate aid:
- politics: all the world’s a-brew and needs its law
- environment: the world’s unzipping as it thaws
- economy: recession; wealth unfairly paid
- humanity: our bunch, becoming more abate
- society: all wanton with its plastic gods
- our health: destroyed with every fry in paw
- tradition: culture pasted over, blue and grey

When shall salvation rescue us from grief and strife?
Where is our superhero? Busy with his life?

What we can do is make ourselves informed and wise:
destroy our atrophy with pride and dignity,
imbued with purpose, duty, hospitality –
and only then can Earth be salvaged from us mice.

Sonnet CCLXVII

A battered ship entangled in the breeze, it shakes
and creaks, belying strength one thinks it should portray.
I doubt its oblong cage, although its massive plane
proves warmer than the seas of air that now invade.

As is if some demon, churning at the sides and panes,
these winds do not relent, but carry on and bray,
forgetting all their summer cousins, filled with grace.
These winds instead encourage enmity, disdain.

Oh turbulent and wicked! Fear exalts my face,
now lifted, wishing that I had the faith to pray.

Instead, within this home my hopes remain for life.
Within, I find seclusion from the chill and cold
through artificial means. For life I beg and hold,
which storms prove frail compared to frigid winter strife.

Sonnet CCLXVI

My life’s a yellow yarn, but not the kind that lies –
the kind that spins, from forth my hands, to sombre death.
Entwining me, enveloping, constricting breath,
my life is not a yarn perhaps – a noose, at times –
then other times it seems unravelling and bright,
the backwards handiwork of grannies put to bed
with thread, awakening then to see it gone and dead
and life destroyed, and never waking from its time.
Who knows just where the scissors chomp? Not I nor you,
but shrewd Atropos knows! She rests her shears and brews
a cup of tea. And all the while, searching here,
we wonder if the end is near or if it’s not,
and as we think, immortal Fates imbibe and plot
- and spin – while here we are, rope’s end and all with fear.

Sonnet CCLXV

His bones were light, much lighter than my brother’s now.
I felt his weight and found my awe-struck self aware
of what he weighed. Accustomed to a burden’s fare,
his feather-heaviness was welcome to my bow.

A child’s magnitude, however, weighs a cloud.
What lightness shall belie, a tantrum will repair;
how little years mislead, commanding ways make rare;
what innocence portrays is shattered by a growl.

Their paradox: a double personality,
a drop and perseverant anger fills the sea.

These things I thought while gently prodding him along,
amazed at how compliant he could seem;
while deep within there lay a monstrous, wicked beast,
which once provoked would never cease to shriek its song.

Sonnet CCLXIV

I cannot write in prose; I’ve lost the simple art.
Its sentences are hopeless chains I cannot move,
its massive paragraphs, the bricks I mustn’t use.
I love my dainty forms, succinct and sharply tart,
creative, flexible, compliant to my heart –
but structured if I wish. There’s logic in its shoe,
which taps a metre one may recollect anew -
but prose is sensible and sombre; rigid, smart.
I rhyme, creatively insert a spicy word;
but prose requires plans and links and sense to work –
the things I gladly flee. I lack the sanity;
I hate reality; I’d rather hide in scenes,
subjective to the viewer’s eye, and comforting –
than sketch my life objectively, and vividly.

Sonnet CCLXIII

The winter wind was moaning pessimistically,
its foghorn worn and overused, a tad bit flat.
It sang some weary minuet; it dancers sat,
for having heard the ditty, wouldn’t move their feet.

Still rasping to the point of boredom’s crude retreat,
the winter wind turned more aggressive, almost mad.
It shrieked but none complied. They picked about their plaid
as if their petty qualms could help them spurn the breeze.

A train then rumbled, wary of the wind at hand.
A semitone apart, their sighs proved dissonant.

The train then parted, sharply on its rigid cue.
The wind remained, unflapped, eternal, overcast –
and stays when even winter parts and trains move past,
its dancers long since dead, the sky turned brightly blue.

Sonnet CCLXII

How green-eyed is the painter of the sunset’s hues!
He cannot capture them and put them in his pot
nor even copy them with dowdy paints he’s bought.
And yet, he loves the sunset, marvels in its blues!

How covetous the dancer is of sunset’s moves!
She cannot be as subtle by the way she’s taught
nor just as strong, capricious, eloquently raw.
And yet, she loves the sunset, worshipping its shoes!

How wishful is the singer of the sunset’s tones!
She cannot radiate the warmth beyond the West
nor speak her beauty only with a moment’s rest.
And yet, she loves the sunset, stores it in her bones!

How jealous are the arts against the sunset’s grace –
and yet, look how they love its flaxen face!

Sonnet CCLXI

If winds would carry me, I’d fly to Neptune’s globe.
I’d stay awhile, wrapped in furs there, merrily,
the clouds of noxious gases swimming like a sea.
Perhaps you’d see me, dancing in the evening’s lobe,
an earring topaz-blue, a shining memory.
As darkness spreads, my piercing punctures holes to see,
the sequins shining in the woman’s nightly robe.

I’d wink at you, but all you’d see is twinkling light,
the lofty ritual of stars within the night.

One cannot tell the quasars from the galaxies
nor what the constellations render anymore.
One cannot see my face in Neptune’s tiny orb
nor even find it, lost within the hidden East.

Sonnet CCLX

I cannot die to live, but always live to die:
my life is spinning out to death from just a thread,
attached to my beginning, birth beyond my head.
I’m like the paradox of day, which also dies,
despite its burst of lustre, bright Aurora’s red,
and in the end it cedes to night, unto its death
of sleep, unknowing, to another shining life.

But do I know for sure what sequel lies beyond?
Shall death’s old moon prevail or shall the sun stay round?

Perhaps the day does not just die to deathly night,
for from the morning, life turns to a brighter death –
the Noon – which grows with larger brilliance of breath,
reanimated from my corpse, the umbra’s light.

Sonnet CCLIX

Si tout le monde me fuit, je vendrai tout mes pleurs.
Et si personne n’achète mes pleurs, je les boirai.
Ainsi, les pleurs que j’aurai bu mettent à pleurer,
et dans cette belle façon, je flotte, je noie, je meurs.
Comme ça je pense, je meurs. Ce n’est pas franc de l’or,
mais tout le monde ne voient pas plus ma tristesse laide.
Peut-être inondés comme moucherons de mai,
ils semblent comme les grands aveugles, sans ses cœurs.

Ainsi, j’ondule à tout mes océans qui passe,
et même dans le décès je les regarde en masse.

Les océans me semblent comme les vrais amis:
ils recueillissent mes larmes comme souvenirs;
ils ne protègent de mal, monstrueux, nuisible, pire,
avec sa forte puissance qui mange mon corps et ri.

Sonnet CCLVIII

I spy a certain death amidst those barren trees,
for winter’s stripped their life with such a bitter whip.
Of late, their leaves have fled, replace with bitter sticks;
their luscious bark now roughened by the wintry breeze.
If I should cross their criss-cross path about my knees,
I’d rip their branches to a mince and they would rip
my precious skin to blood. Entangled limb to limb,
my blood – as well, their arms – would fall beyond my feet.

I’d pick it up, my blood, so desolate and red,
I’d pick them up the sticks, and toss them overhead.

They’d fall again; I’d gather them, the wooden hands,
and hold them, recollecting loss to recreate.
As if performing divination, then I’d wait
and count my grievances while gathering the land.

Sonnet CCLVII

A word is water, ever-changing, fickle, cold.
I pour you some, returning you to liquid thoughts,
which cannot live unless one drops the wordy drops.
We cannot tell if words have stayed in mind till old,
for forethought cannot permeate a water drop,
though colours do, and flavour can imbue with awe,
though plain remains, perhaps as dull and just as bold.

But like the water too, when words are spent and soiled,
they’re irretrievable and left at sea to cloy.

Then happenchance shall seal it with a kiss
of icy permanence. And shall it stay so proud?
Or melt away in vapour, gaseous like a cloud,
evaporating, sharing life, or else, abyss?

Sonnet CCLVI

I wonder why the world is always smiling
when so much of our lives are so consumed with woe.
Perhaps a pessimistic view; I dare not prose:
the explanation’s long and riddled with my tears.

Well, all the world’s a-smiling, except for me.
It almost seems the world is ill - perhaps that’s so -
where everyone is gleeful, dancing to and fro –
but probably it’s me that has the malady.

Oh yes, I am an invalid – don’t come too close!
I’m leprous – crude contagion seems to be my woe.

But let me here, in sadness. Do not let me sting.
Exist in happiness; exclude me from your guild.
I will come back to join you later – save your guilt.
I hope my sadness flees, or else come rescue me.

Sonnet CCLV

What shining snow beyond my windowpane! How brown!
Surrounded by the gaping grass, a strange chartreuse,
the splendid plane of lawn glows as a muddy mousse!
To think, the snow is sparse and what, December now?
I think myself too lucky for Pollution’s frown!
These clumps of snow, so gently touched by sun and goose,
are spread with canine excrement of darkish poop –
what chance – Pollution’s work! How kindly she endows,
and what a mastermind! As searing as a flame,
disrupting Old Man Winter’s stupid, foolish game -
salvation like prophetic scripture, free of vice!
Pollution favours us! We giggle at her touch,
which slaps the frozen earth and turns it to a mush,
exalting strange, unnatural warmth, obstructing ice!

Sonnet CCLIV

An anxious Andrew bashed his shopping cart around
and packed in cookies; slapped in juices, yellow, red;
then grabbed his wife’s requests and zipped the way ahead.
His enemy was Time, his watch so cruelly round,
while rushing to the checkout; seconds like wet hounds,
their fangs a-dripping. Pulling through to aisle ten,
to checkout nine, where those with items eight or less
were bound to head, he fast advanced! But turning round -

He saw the stupid crackers he forgot in haste.
He raced reverse – the party would be starting soon!
And now he had an item more – so nine – how cruel!
The hand struck three – upon his shaking, fumbling wrist –

Anxiety then melted to a laughing howl –
his watch was early – almost by a half an hour!

Sonnet CCLIII

I read her voice; I feel her sound; I hear her voice:
such is the spell that Emily still casts on me.
It’s only then – united through perception’s tree –
entwined between experience – we interlace.

The print is tactile, racing on my palms and face:
envelop me and let me ponder in your seas;
ignite my heart and send it spinning to the breeze;
exalt my sorrow – join it to your victim-tray.

And hang my heavy head to this – your clientele –
and cast a charm with ink, and dance your wicked spell.

Bewitch me; pour a poisoned potion; drown me now:
instruct me to behold myself in sorrow’s nest;
to fly away as birds, unto the rising West,
a voyage to a distant tree, a distant bough.

Sonnet CCLII

Oh Frosty Jack, what maiden has afflicted you?
How frigid her rejection; even more your rage!
How turbulent your frosty fury, now uncaged,
unleashed in wicked anger, pallid, ashen, shrewd!

How wickedly your shattered heart has come to brew!
A broken mix of icy tears, a bitter mace,
a weapon ripping wounds, exposing them to air,
a wintry blizzard seeking crude revenge anew.

Please spill that chilly blood again, you wintry fiend,
and let me suffocate on such a pungent drink!

You liked me not; how cruel of you to let me live!
You should have slayed me in the dark of day, for now
I cannot die! Hence Frost and I shall share our vow
of misery, eternal, evermore so acrid!

Sonnet CCLI

The winter’s such a crude reminder of your face –
how could you be so frigid in this time of warmth?
These wintry hexagons shall always be a storm
and never beauty, only wickedness, light grey,
so pallid, lethal in betrayal – oh, such grace! –
that murders me, and murders me, and snaps my heart,
which melts, refreezing to the bitter, icy stars
of winter – snowflakes – delicately, cruelly made.

And snow I shovel, push away in growing piles.
But you – I cannot purge – yet you have purge my wiles.

And what have I but tattered snowflakes, littering,
polluting blank expanse within my asphalt mind,
obstructing darkness with the ancient hope of time?
Now even Spring cannot amend my shabby wings.

Sonnet CCL

I have a little dog - her name is Butterfly.
I take her to my school. I carry her to bed.
She used to have a ribbon, nice and long and red,
but then I took it off, and said to it, “Goodbye!”

My doggie is my friend – because she cannot lie.
She doesn’t hit me, though at times she’s bruised and red
from violent gallops, lunchtime, journeys in our bed;
the spaceship rides to planets, green and huge and high.

When Mommy washes her, I feel so sad and blue,
but when she’s done, my doggie’s such a different hue!

Adventures with my doggie make my life so bright
although she’s silent. Still, a friend’s that’s silent’s best.
She doesn’t bite me, hurt, betray, or make a mess –
she’s comfort for my heart, and cuddly in the night!

Sonnet CCXLIX

I do not know what Silence is, but know its sound:
a hissing furnace, meshing cars at falling dusk.
At least, when coming close, the closing silence trusts
I know its call. Descending, almost mutely loud -

I do not know how Silence feels, but know its touch:
sensation dawning on my scalp, a tactile musk,
an odour visible as darkness, vast and brusque.
I know the call. But Silence flees my waiting brow –

It angers me: and even now, my silent words
are setting minds about, as noisy, crowing birds.

Perhaps in Death I’ll see my Silence, though it keeps
no bulky form, and cruel sensation’s gift shall die.
Or maybe Death has other feelings for our eyes:
why Sleepers never wake from blissful, silent Sleep.

Sonnet CCXLVIII

The love of youth, one says, is but a fleeting lie.
I hope my love is constant so my love is true,
but how can I defy the wisdom and the rue
or wicked Age and Time? I must obey or die,
for Death escapes the loop of Time and that of Life;
and Death defies the customs of the Ageist Rule.
But Life and Love, entangled with the nasty two,
are thus subject to foul wickedness and strife.

Oh Thisbe, why so fleeting from the lioness?
It proves a better death than love’s cruel happiness!

Alas, we love, we hurt, commend our sighs above -
for if my love is fickle, cast me to my death,
and Love will share my sudden robbery of breath.
Oh such a Fate, oh such a fleeting whim of love!

Sonnet CCXLVII

I wish I could just mail this snapshot to your mind;
enclose it in a postcard’s monumental square:
for how these words dilute the how and when and where -
but now they’re all I have. I save the scraps I find
and knit them. Knit them. Knit them, hoping something’s right.
And no, it’s never perfect – never is. Despair.
My strange despair. I edit, groping, grasping air –
and all these lowly, meagre words are all I find.

Oh, just as well, I guess. Indite, indict my soul:
extract experience and hang it here in gold.

Or silver’s passable. Or maybe bronze or black.
Or blue, all splattered in explosions all in rage;
on napkins from the pizzeria; Yellow’s page;
a rotting test; or salvaged splinters – wooden track.

Sonnet CCXLVI

The fire in the frost, a raging coldness here -
is beautiful in form, entwined in frosty leaves.
White diamonds, precious gems, are hidden in those eaves
like earrings made of ice, and shining like a tear.

My heat dissolves the fire – touching there, I sear.
A window opens up, upon the pane from me,
until, within the handiwork, a gap I see
and fingers five of mine so mutely there appear.

The spiny trees I see, through window’s window seen,
and frost imposes on their shapely, tepid green.

I leave the bus. The wind is bitter, though I see
the funny, backward things the kids had scribed in words.
Adorning them, the frost appears like trees or birds,
perhaps a souvenir of bus ride scenery.

Sonnet CCXLV

Let’s hide away in dark, concealed from all the world;
and so alone we shall not be, but lone together here.
The outside world is noisy, loud, and full of cheer
as brooding, broth of us succumb to silence, pure.

Oh join us, friend, oh gladly join our dismal hurt.
Has Fate rejected you? Has Pleasure shed a tear?
Oh what a joy to hide, and such a wondrous year:
a year of dismal joy, a life of hidden hurt.

In darkness dancing, only voices transfer words,
and if our ears do die, our fingers fly like birds.

And if they die in darkness, what a happy death!
They’d die together here, so smothered in our grief.
And if the world is cold, it didn’t steal our breath.
We shunned its happy face and carved it in relief.