An Epitaph

Deep in the earth, beneath unknowing skies,
I rest at last, far past the centuries.
The visitors have long bid their good-byes;
no maidens come to lay their laurel wreaths.

Though on a summer stroll across the hills
a courting couple oft pay their respects:
and wishing well with stolen daffodils
invite a blessing as they introspect.

"For love, for truth, for art," engraves the stone:
beyond the fateful words no history;
and all the joys and sorrows that I'd known
are silent to the traveller, wondering.

But from immortal eulogy begins
a second life, reborn to brilliance.

Sonnet CCCLXI

Interrogate the robins – ask them why –
some sudden sunshine peeks between the leaves.
Familiar laughter claims the startled ear
and torpid languor confiscates the eyes –


We spent such carefree days beneath the skies
and when the rain had interspersed between,
we hid like naughty children, impishly
and laughed and laughed and laughed away the sky –


Relinquish you –
                            beyond my feeble grasp,
released beyond my grandiose love at last,
such scenes we’ll see again our separate ways?
Rekindled in my solitary view
at all familiar turns I think of you –
do you remember me at all today?

Sonnet CCCLX

But in my sad seclusion, saw the sky;
some strange, Immortal sunlight beckoned me:
a fragile wonder touched my everything –
I felt a pensive calm, not knowing why.


And in that humble instant, dropped my pride;
without my strength and inner harmony,
searched – desperate for a Higher sympathy.


But wondered at my strange internal lies –
uncertain of the warmth and bliss I felt.
For did I, in my lonesome emptiness,
contrive to forge imagined happiness –


or did my cold self-adequacy melt –
thus drawing me toward the kind Above,
which waited for the day I needed
                                                        – Love?

Sonnet CCCLIX

Disintegrating into rippling shards:
the crystal earth, at once, is liquefied.
A subtle smile of sunshine at my side,
an unexpected twinkling from afar –
and thus, my heart, as well, is eased apart.


And all the tantrums and those icy eyes
seem silly…all these heartless thoughts, a lie?
Dissolved, at once, beneath the burning stars.


Some unknown bliss, some unrequited plant
shoots, surging, unpredicted, from the core –
and could I wish it stay here evermore?


The scent of joy unfolds beyond its hand –
and would these seconds last for centuries,
such simple days could paint eternities.

Sonnet CCCLVII

The autumn’s infantry – how mighty!
Virile the plumes of gold arise –
exulted by each twig and berry.
The jealous, torpid summer dies!
No greater adversary vanquished,
no stronger rival fought and finished!


But how could pale and waxy sands,
and softest sunlights, light and wan –
compare! Our wispy, pallid present –
with haughty triumph? How we’ve aged,
ah, sea of frozen crystal days…
preserved, canopic fossil – aimless –


though in those sure and martial times
we stood incomparable, sublime!

Sonnet CCCLVI

At last I breathe again, at last I live:
perhaps my loneliness was only relative.
I once desired love – your company –
but I shall fill these hours easily.
From time-worn, weathered eyes erasing you,
replacing such projected joys with truth,
I live once more in grounded, present time
unbound of empty fantasy and rhyme.


I roam the changing earth, but pondering
as drifting, migrant snow joins, flight by flight –
and neither wind nor I know anything
of where we go from here and when or why –


but all we know is that we still exist,
if still unseen – at least by loyal sunshine kissed.

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 CCCLIII

Epiphany? My love is shorn to shreds!
A guileless love beguiled by devious ends…
Dark, bitter grief ignites my inner core –
I cannot love this monster anymore!


And yet – I tremble at each docile smile!
I loved the clever traitor all the while.
I now regret that fatal day, when first –
a charming word deceived my artless thirst.


And yes, I still feel dearly for the fiend;
a foolish heart does not know want from need.


Ignore the ingrate! Flee the treachery!
But how we still dream fondly, stubbornly;
demanding vengeance for our suffering,
yet far too weak to do the injuring.

Sonnet CCCLII

But how those crystal eyes stared back at me!
Grand ecstasies sparked through my soul and mind;
disarming and distracting harmonies
obscured my scrutiny and made me blind.


I waited, waited - how I darkly pined!
Some desperate, thrilling, growing hopefulness
turned ravenous at every sound and sight –
then soon fell, plummeting to hopelessness.


And I remember - stubbornly - with bliss -
at how each word and stolen brush and glance
drew joyously, exultant like a kiss,
upon my steely thoughts…as if to dance.


But not today – there still remains a space -
where cruel, blue plastic mocks your worthy place.

Sonnet CCCLI

The dying afternoon, diaphanous –
how young October smiled upon my cheek!
Then through a stretch of sun-filled oxygen
your voice and eyes called blithely out to me!


We walked, our eyes upon the skyward seas,
our eyes delirious with shifting skies
as clouds subsided to obscurity
in grandiose swashes, gold and pastel dyed.


I could have stayed forever at your side,
evaporated honey everywhere;
but as our paths diverged in weary light
I drowned into intoxicating air.


I paused – in step – exultant, yet forlorn
and as the leaves spun round, I stood
                                                            - transformed!

Sonnet CCCL

I stand, exhilarated, on the hills –
I burn with new and sprightly inner fire!
The winds of autumn cannot bind my will:
my yearning glance ignites with strange desire!
With fierce furore, these eyes will never tire –
I search the turbid skies for signs of warmth.
Beloved summer! Ever-tuneful lyre!
To leap into those warm and loving arms!


I’ll wait, unloved, forlorn, as lovers are,
but only when your promise sings again
will you return, melodious and warm –
and only then will carefree folly reign,
my foolish heart revived once more to mirth.
And only then will blossoms fill the earth!

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 CCCXLVIII

The trembling leaves fly quicker as I pass -
If I could snatch one for myself, I would!
But could that transient oak leaf ever last?


If I could slice a piece of sun, I would!
One sliver, glowing like a seraph could,
As ardent as a lover’s keen farewell!


If I could steal the blazing sky, I would!
I’d need the ocean’s blue, expensive well,
But where the clouds should go, I cannot tell!


Alas, the summer cannot flee the fate
six ancient pomegranate seeds have dealt:
her stay is brief, but dazzles everyday
before her burnished sun-crown, songbird calls;
her grass perfumes – her sunsets – yield to fall!

Sonnet CCCXLVI

The leaves, already gilt untimely gold,
declare that cherished summer fleets too soon!


The winds, already prematurely cold;
the sun, already mild at half past noon -
Ah, summer seemed as young as sprightly June!
Too quick the torrid dream flits sadly by!


Too quick I fear the changes steal my youth,
as if my sylvan tresses too, ignite
and litter moor and dale and precipice –
as if they had no other life to lead!


As if a heart were steadfast like the skies
and thoughts were constant as the worthy trees;
as if a futile wish for summer lives –
as if autumnal minds could answer it!

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 CCCIV

There’s something I forgot – I dropped it on the way to school.
It’s lost now, covered by the snow, and never to be found.
The very thing I lost is buried in these whitish mounds
and stubbornly stays buried in its snowy tomb.

I look up at the blazing sky and feel like quite the fool.
I’ve known this thing before perhaps – perhaps it’s still around,
or left back at the house – perhaps it’s lost back at the town?
The thing confounds me with its game. Its riddle’s strange and cruel.

Perhaps you’ve lost a twin to mine – a spool of thought escaping.
When reckless, threads pop through your head and drift off to the snow.
And though you search and search, it’s somewhere else– that much you know.

But where, exactly? Was it critical, this thing?
Or something trivial? I walk away and hope my brain’s
intact, or other things will spill and make me more inane.

Sonnet CLXXXVIII

L’amour fleurit comme tout les noires et sombres nuits:
une fleur si belle et si mystérieuse comme toi.
Mais tout les temps tu fuis le jour et moi,
tes émotions, ombreuses; ses mots, le cœur de bruit.
Tu sais la joie? Je pense que non. La crise te suit;
les grandes tristesses sont tous tes grands nuages, si froid.
Mais toutes tes gouttes de pluie sont des larmes de moi –
et tu est insouciante et comme la lune, conduis.

Tu es la chose le jour fait comme un mal mémoire,
qui reste, puis, quitte ciel chaque souvenir de moi.

Mais maintenant, j’habite après la nuit de moi.
Le jour m’embrase, et chaque étreinte me donne la perte,
la perte de la mémoire, la perte de perte en perte –
et maintenant, j’oublie la sombre nuit, je crois.

Sonnet CLXXXV

A sailor never misses land until he leaves,
the sea a barren desert stretching out to sky.
A seagull never misses sea until he flies,
the sky a cold expanse descending to the seas.

Yet on horizons, sunrise brings no joy.
Their plights become the frigid sea, the icy sky.
The only colour seen is blue, expanding deep and high
and land’s elusive; more so is the fickle sea.

We journey, soaring, happy, through our pretty lives,
though aimlessly, upon our glassy seas or sky.

The world drifts past as imperceptible as joy.
We wait for glimpse of land for crude and rare relief
or like the gull, must view our hope beyond our reach,
so mocking, playing cruel existence as its ploy.

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 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.