Sonnet CCCLIV

My geese – my ever-faithful geese – have left!
I watched the emptied autumn sky, bereft,
and watched them steal away to tropic lands…
oh how’ll they’ll love those toasty, sun-baked sands!


I cursed their infidelity that day
and bent upon my lonesome, grumpy way –
I’d find some other loyal friend to love!


But everyday I’d check the skies above
and find them vacant as my mournful heart.


Then suddenly – in shy, reluctant March
they squawked once more upon the melting moors!


And I – my injured self! – ignored their lure
(with great contempt) – and sauntered, haughty, off –
remarking how we’ve changed – and how they’ve not!

Sonnet CCCXLIX

The world, disfigured through the window pane,
appears to me a foreign, foreign beast.
I almost couldn’t say it was the same;
it once knew sharp and clear geometry.


Instead, some other logic speaks to me,
where lines melt wholly into endless flight
and light splits, starlit, into ecstasy;
untimely rains play freely with the eyes
and transient images dance swiftly by.


Emerging from the depths of rainy mess
she enters into view one final time,
delineated clearly from the rest.


But soon, she joins the liquid world out there,
obscured, forgotten – blurred beyond repair.

Sonnet CCCXL

Attired richly – handsome ship, where to?

The grandest feasts where held for all the crew,

the Kingdom’s King and Queen have visited.

A garland circled every maiden’s head –

the skies were never bluer on that day!

We once knew love, we once had known the way,

but now we sail, forgotten, and alone.

By fog obscured, by raging rainstorms blown,

we have no end to seek and no return.

The ocean looms at every futile turn

yet hopelessly we search for sight of land.

We curse the weather’s fiercely bitter hand

and suffer in our salty carousel,

remembering a time we knew ourselves.

Sonnet CCCXXXVI

The glance is yours: do with it what you will.
To injure or inspire, love or kill –
the eyes speak volumes more than little lies.

I ponder this while looking at your eyes,
those pools of mercury, so cruel and cold.
Why leave such enmity untold?
Because the very animosity
would strike me dead with sorrow, instantly.

If loathing did not permeate your soul,
perhaps my eyes would not reflect your own.
Perhaps my eyes would not be lethal knives,
which pierce the heart with bitterness and spite
and read like Hate’s encyclopedia,
containing endless words, but not enough.

Sonnet CCCXXXIV

My envy seethes below the fallen leaves,

defiant hills of discontented green.

I cannot find serenity today:

where are the placid fields of yesterday?

The strident branches reach up to the sky,

almighty in their rage, and ever high.

How void the arms which once held happiness,

which now are shrivelled in their bitterness;

how stark the cloudless sky of gray above,

a limitless expanse devoid of sun.

I have no place at lovely Nature’s feast;

the hosts all mimic me and tease.

I only see the progeny of rage,

which taunts me, multiplied in every way.

Sonnet CCCXXXIII

Its garden dead, its contents cold and bare,
What’s left is just a shell to be repaired.
The sprawling weeds reign king, the grass is long;
the tulips lay forgotten in the throng.

The truck sits, blocking all the driveway space,
forbidding in its grand yet simple grace.
The kids play all around, unbidden, free,
but pause to wave as I pass, wondering.

How love had driven them to tend their home!
The sentiments have fled, one can behold –
the house is peeling, barren, messy, tired.
But final rays of afternoon ignite;
the sparkling windows flash a last farewell.
The truck clangs shut, and leaves with troll-like stealth.

Sonnet CCCXXX

Today the sky is tearful, dark, and sad.

The walls are greyish-brown and drab;

they’re not the taupe I chose the other day.

Awakening today is bitter, full of pain;

my bed sheets strangle me; they hold me back.

Their jarring, lurid yellow drives me mad;

their cheerfulness is mocking, hateful, dry.

The windows drown me with their torrid light.

My neck and back are sore; I need a drink.

An anger burns my mouth; my teeth are clenched.

My empty cup sits, waiting next to me –

my heart agrees. The world is emptiness.

It takes a massive bound to leap from bed,

to have the guts to face the day ahead.

Sonnet CCCXXIX

I cachinnate at all our three-chord songs,

at all attempts to fit in and belong.

Derision greets the slogans that I loathe,

the mindless humming of our T.V. shows.

But I discover what we all have known;

I dig, display emotions all have known;

subscribed to trends, like all have done before;

subjected life to patterns used before.

For we are humans, similar and all;

restrictions bind us to a common thread.

We tread for freedom, hear its blatant call,

but realize there’s only us ahead.

And we’re so all alike, recycling,

as if there is no news but our dis-ease.

Sonnet CCCXXVI

Exalted in the happiness of pain,

The world is crowning me with strange disdain!

How proud I’ll be within its reverie:

My wreath’s an honour, undeserved of me.

My rough exterior’s inscribed by hate,

a fitting way to demonstrate my fate.

(Or else, I seem too arrogant, too proud,

rejoicing silently of hateful crowds.)

But like most monarchs I shall take to bed,

a-weary of the honours I’ve received.

And soon, as words begin to crowd my head,

I realize I have many woes to grieve.

And hate accumulates as pride grows dim…

the world is mine, and yet I serve its whims.

Sonnet CCCV

I tumbled in a world of poetry, unknowing then
it planted many unborn seeds within my growing head.
When life became more cruel and difficult and more bereft,
I wrote. Those early seeds exploded, eating up the sad.
It turned to times I lost what little that I used to have –
and namely things like dignity and peace and happiness.
and even cherished poetry was causing buoyant debt;
the rhymes turned darker, weaker, pushing me toward the mad.

And how has poetry transfigured me? I’ve learnt to live,
and to express, of course. I steal the world a second time
to take in all its details differently and make them mine.

Now everything’s a poem and everything has sharpened since.
I can’t say phrases properly – they always tend to rhyme!
How much my life has changed – now poetry’s my way of life!

Sonnet CCLXXVI

He hates the mirror. He looks at it and sighs.
It’s hard to looks upon himself and see his face
without detesting it. Deprived of youthful grace,
bereft of happiness, without a joyful smile –
he hates those children, blithe and charming, juvenile;
he hates these families, enjoying time like waste;
he hates and envies all the world, so armed with lies!

For self-contentment’s false; so’s joviality.
The world’s a dark and gaping hole, a mean chicanery.

Or isn’t it because he wishes more from life,
and more of merriment; to see that things are fine?
Or is it that he wants to know that peace of mind,
that feeling, waking up, embracing more than strife?

Sonnet CCLXXV

Intense and bitter were the icy winds he crossed,
his jacket clutched within his anxious, nervous fist.
He walked into the store and glanced upon his list,
evasive of the camera. His hair was tossed,
his face unshaven – eyes like frigid fire, lost.
He snatched a basket; glued it to his quaking wrist.
He clambered through the store, remembered what he missed,
turned back and veered again, to pay for what he bought.

As feared, that same cashier was there, her smile, fake.
She smacked her gum, forgetting him, their love – their hate.

An anger flared like sun. He seized his blanched receipt.
Her eyes acknowledged his. He grabbed his groceries.
He stormed away. He stared upon the ashen sheet.
Her name, impudent, sauntered in his thoughts and teased.

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 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 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 CCXLIV

You kiss me on the cheek, a frozen, bitter kiss.
At times I wish for you. You’re early, sometimes not.
At time you bring me joy, but not for very long.
You’re fickle, ever-changing, fleeting from my bliss.
And stark. You’re barren, frigid white as an abyss.
You’re frozen, cold, and yet your passion feels so hot.
I’d almost say you’re sly, but no, you’re really not.
you’re nude, exposed, and always there: ubiquitous.

And there are times – the times I cannot stand your face,
the times I wish to slap you as you slap my face.

And yet, I love you. Winter’s bland without you here.
You’re precious, shining, platinum, and silvery,
an ornament that shimmers only once a year,
a costly spice that nature sprinkles sparingly.

Sonnet CCXXX

To Mr. (Mrs.) Hacker #398:

I’m free of you at last – you’re vanquished – finally!
I hope you pay for what you do. (I guess we’ll see.)
Within my heart, for you alone, I saved some hate.
I saved it all for you because your stupid bait –
the crafty e-mails, monstrous download trickery -
corrupted my computer well and merrily.
I hope the cyber-cops will find you…just you wait!

And when they do, they’ll strap their manacles on you
and all accomplices: your wicked little crew.

My thanks go out to forums, solving daily hacks,
and spyware software. Thanks to better firewalls,
I’m safe and now I know the multitude of facts.
We’ll never come return to be your puppet dolls!

Sonnet CCXXII

His name was Matt; I still remember that as clear as day.
He made my life so miserable, so long ago.
Back then, he called me names, but then, I didn’t know
what all those words had meant. He shouted every day,
“Hey China-Chink!” And snickers filled the bus in brays
and shame endowed me with its growing hood of woe.
He’s poke sadistic fun at Asians – loud and bold –
while friends of his would laugh and laugh each horrid day.

The sharpest sticks and twigs; the sharpest flint and stones -
could hurt me all they’d like and break my fragile bones.

But never could they hope to vie with words of ice,
more sharp than splinters, crueller than a sword of steel.
For bones can piece together; cuts can always heal –
but words shall always stay, embedded with their vice.

Sonnet CCXIX

I beg to differ to the fact that Hell is hot:
I say that Hell is cold as Hell – and just as mean.
It’s holding ladders for my Dad, as up he leans,
to put up Christmas lights on eaves with hooks we bought.
We move the leaden ladder to and fro a lot,
like frozen crabs a-scuttling to the yells of fiends.
Eventually, my fingers turn a lovely green,
my hat is itchy, legs are sore, my mind is fraught.

And still there’s half a way’s to go, a “wee” bit more…
I suffer, freezing, as the snow begins to pour.

I’m bitter, wondering why such a holiday
is celebrated with such foul means as this.
And then, sadistic snakes of wind begin to hiss,
as moaning, in my sadness, shout I, “Woe is me!”

Sonnet CCXV

I have a topic every time I write – but then –
it squirms and wiggles, thrashing everywhere I move,
develops like a foetus, growing more and more,
until I see how everything should rightly end.

However, not expectantly, my words amend,
rewriting to another place. My child’s gore
spills on my page, controlling me. I start the war
and soon we battle. Who shall win? Just find the end.

And you shall see how thoughts have sorted out like mice,
lined up at last, behaving prim and clean and nice.

But oftentimes my children come to pressure me.
I follow what they tell my hands, which should suffice,
but no – the war shall rage. And in the end, advice
from them has changed my writing to another beast.