Sonnet CCCLXV

I am - too happy on this modest day.
The oxygen owns no unearthly charm;
but as the sun embalms the lucid way,
my wonder greets the breeze upon my arm.

Bouquets of unrequited smiles prance;
their pirouettes spin aimless on the grass.
Eternities resound their empty dance
as pliant leaves sift through the hourglass.

I cannot forecast all the grievances
that each covert Tomorrow seems to know.
I cannot cause the Heavens to descend
or pause Fortuna's wheel forever, though:

As I recall the morsels of this hour,
no mournful day shall ever wield its power.

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 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 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 CCCXIII

To Robin,
             lying on the asphalt.
Another time would find us – live –
upon a grassy hill of beryl,
conversing as the time flies by.

We’d daily meet beyond the meadow,
a pair concealed beneath a willow,
the shadows overhearing us –
our gossip of the latest fuss.

But who has time these days to chatter?
My strict routines keep feet a-patter;
and you’re just trying to survive,
amidst my world – besides -

You’re roadkill, dead upon the road,
your breast a purest ruby-gold.

Sonnet CCC

She wrapped her woollen shawl against her tender bones,
as frail and white as freshly fallen snow outside.
The snowflakes mutely sprinkled gingerly like rice,
then melted, leaving tarnished grasses to the cold.
She mutely waited by her simple, ashen phone
and thought of all her children’s bulging, frog-like eyes,
with wonder, watching early snows and all the ice -
but that was long ago, and thoughts like that are old.

She missed her role as mother, though. The time seemed brief,
yet full, like festive winters passing on the breeze.

She waited for her older husband’s waking words
and wondered at the emptiness within. She saw
as sparrows took to morning flight while mother birds
would wait with worry, loneliness beginning, raw.

Sonnet CCLXXIX

A new year spreads before me like a snowy page,
another leaf of white awaiting marks and prints.
So much to use – escaping from my fingertips –
a plane of eager time poised on the newer age.

Envisioning what fresher seasons shall engage,
I look – anticipating – to these fields and hints
of what’s to come. The future wakes from sleeping fits –
reluctant – starting unto human guessing games.

The seconds, glittering, unbutton in the snow,
their shining flakes like frosty jewels in the cold!

There’s much anticipation – moods change much within a day –
from boredom of the past to welcoming the new.
The minutes fly – time’s racing by – the skies are blue!
The snowflakes fall – the year’s alight – and so’s the fray!

Sonnet CCLXXVIII

Polyphony, as sumptuous as a rich brocade,
shines vivid crimson with its careful mastery.
A layer through a layer in a tapestry,
inverted motives in the fabric interplay.
One sees the colours, recognising themes like days,
arranged in curlicues of phoenixes and seas
of countersubjects, slit like ruby string,
between the lines of subjects, woven in a braid.
The balanced harmonies, which satisfy each voice
cohere so gingerly, a stitch by stitch with poise,
familiar majesty, a souvenir of old,
a tad bit tarnished from disuse, still grandly frail,
courageous in its use, a kingly conquest sailed –
surmised as luxury, subdued as precious gold.

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 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 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 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 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.

Sonnet CCXXXII

The metal bench felt rigid to his sore behind,
the Christmas music, tinny, to his aching ears.
And so the shopping passed like this throughout the years:
a frantic, fruitless search, with nothing good to find.
This winter had been brutal to his weighty mind:
his wife was turning forty after all her fears;
but gifts were never bought, becoming all his fears.
He waited now, a deer in headlights dying, blind.

More fearful now, he knew he couldn’t buy some trash,
although it grew more tempting as he turned more brash.

But then, remembering how late he stayed at work,
how home improvements stole their time to love and live,
he knew at last the greatest gift that he could give
was time together, shared, a time he couldn’t shirk.

Sonnet CCXII

A year of goals and plans to make my life less bad,
agendas, long-term blueprints, failed attempts at more.
A month of disappointment, plain frustration’s war,
exhaustion’s beast, woke from the sleepless nights I had.
A week of writing, adding, talking, being mad,
obsessing, doing homework, doing projects, more.
A day of stress, remorse, upset, and times that bore,
and yelling, screaming, hurting, brawling, being sad.

Thank goodness ice cream, popcorn – foods like that – exist!
Without them, life would be a dismal, sombre list.

So coming home from school, unhappy as the sky,
I chug my cola., eat my chips. When Mom comes home,
she cooks more comfort foods. And like a greedy gnome,
I eat and eat until my heart’s content – or try!

Sonnet CCXI

On rainy days, the ladders come to play with me.
They drop my player down a serpent’s cruel abyss
and make me wish that space was where I got to miss.
Alas I’m never petulant for long – for glee
is just a toss away. Surmounting ladders three,
I’m winning! But my brother’s close behind, amiss.
Then soon the tables turn and then my happiness
is fleeting as my fortune, dimming with each leap.

How quickly hours pass! What fun surmounts us here!
Perhaps I’ll play this game again, each day each year!

Alas, the rain subsides. The sun resumes its rounds.
The electricity comes back to all the lights.
But staying in our home, we watch the thudding pounds
of villains losing on T.V. in awesome fights.

Sonnet CCVII

With wild abandon, all the kids would run around.
We’d messify the basement like a big stampede.
We’d moo like cows, we’d screech like birds, we’d mount a steed
and fly like cheetahs, searching like a wise, old hound.
We’d play some board games. Bored, we’d board a couch and read.
And then we’d watch T.V. until we had to eat.
We’d go upstairs, complaining, making such a sound.

But none of us would eat a thing. We’d want to play.
For weeks we waited for this frabjous party day!

We’d run downstairs and raise a ruckus there once more.
We couldn’t tell how late it was – we didn’t care –
We only wanted fun and played our truth or dare -
but then they had to leave, departing out the door.

Sonnet CCII

The cooking days in cooking class were tons of fun:
there was a silly time I added tablespoons
of salt instead of smaller teaspoons in the food;
another time we made some cinnamon-y buns,
but made the larger, double recipe and some
had overflowed and burned into a blackened soot.
And when we used the powdered broth and not the soup,
our pasta turned too salty for our hungry tongues.

And though we had our share of small and great mistakes,
we kept on making cookies, mac and cheese, and cakes.

And so our cooking days last year were fun and odd:
we laughed at what we did and how we slyly faked
to like the food we cooked despite our small mistakes.
And yet, we learned so much, by silly errors taught.

Sonnet CLXXXIII

The popcorn’s littered on the ground and rug
and in their hair. Like fireflies and moths
dismembered from the night and swiftly lost
(astray in happy warmth and friendly hugs).
Vermillion from movie marathons,
their beady eyes are flaming ochre suns,
persistent, gnawing movies; mouths a-froth;
the monsters all around the clock are up.

But fattened from the peanut butter’s taupe,
they’re hungry still and feed their growing greed
with movies, scary, wrapping them in fear.
But also wrapped in blankets, red and mauve,
they scream and yell and cackle, shout and screech;
but all in fun, for none shall shed a tear.

Sonnet CLXXXII

Outside, crusaders in the blowing breeze
have battled everyday on walks to school.
They chatter frozen mouths and teeth in cool,
inviting wind and shiver icy knees.
Though chilled, the warriors still persevere
and brawl against the wind, so cold and cruel.
Although without a colour or a hue,
invisibly thus hides that enemy.

But armed are they, with mittens and with gloves,
with cherries on their backs that hold their books,
and knitted hats that flaunt their strengthened might,
While staunchly shielded by a mother’s love.
they sail their seas, still fighting as we look
and like two kites they sail beyond our sight.