Sonnets

Last week and a bit was Valentine's Day/Single Awareness Day/GPS Day. Now that you've gotten all of the chocolate out of your system, I'm about to revisit the topic. But in a good, literary way! Now, if you're vaguely familiar with sonnets, you'll understand that the majority of them are about being in love, comparing girls to a summer's day, not admitting impediment to the marriage of two minds, etc. etc. For my cynical part, my favorite has to be Shakespeare's 130th sonnet:


My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks; 
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
   And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
   As any she belied with false compare. 


Who can resist a man who somehow makes reeking breath and wiry hair romantic?


But what about not being in love? Where's the poetry for the single-ized that doesn't send the reader into a downward spiral of woe, into the depths of despair and ice cream? I would try, I really would, but my poetry can only either be super-emo or humorous; I just can't take myself seriously enough to trust my creative endeavors outside of prose.


Thankfully, I live with someone who manages emotional stability even while writing poetry about not being in love. These sonnets are taken from a sequence written by my roommate Hope for a British Literature class, and she's gracefully allowed me to share them with you. If you exist.

1.

I question myself closely: can you prove

that I must only speak of hearts I’ve earned

or is it possible, from stories learned,

to drop my pen to page and practice love,

a specter to receive it? I will vow

that, though romance breathes not so dizzy here,

yet I have breath of love within, and dear

would expel it. For little exists now

when I compare to what I build inside

my heady heart; all ether-real; wonder

that joy would be as a pulling under.

I know the air of love: will say I’ve lied –

alone, to tell of coupling and hearts

ablaze – or will allow these gentle arts?

2.

To claim possession o’er the multitude

complexities love brings, I would not dare;

I feast on worry as it were a food

though living free of all romantic care.

To add – no, multiply consumption by

four-chambered hearts divided by our fate

or own cruel dismissal! Or will my

strange hunger turn to what I cannot sate?

Oh weary mouth, small fraction of the whole,

preparing morsels pal’table and sweet

for other’s ears. An exponential need

for their approving murmurs tears my soul

without a one who stands superior.

Care great enough, I would not ask for more.

3.

Into the woods I wander slow but fast

my blood is thumping: will there be here found

a mossy secret whispered ‘long the ground

or myriads of mem’ries e’en the past

may not recall? Leaves: yellow-green, half-mast

to hide from wind, in stillness all unwound.

With glor’ious light, the forest’s head is crowned.

and I remain, of all its creatures, last

but happiest. Sir Petrarch would no doubt

fault find, deer lacking, with this place of peace

and puzzle how I tarried there without

I find myself immersed. Look to the east,

dear Frank, if listing yet for beauty true.

Your romance nothing has to morning new.

  

4.

Though not to say that I despise the tales

they spin for me; the fabric soft and fine

and crafted carefully, opaque as veils,

material caressing. T’would be mine

so easily, all shimmering with hope:

“Oh, you were made as half and pair, and soon

completion will arrive. But meanwhile, cope

by waiting patiently,” their cheery tune.

I will not wear, nor put to use such clothes

as if my solitary state gave shame.

My future being, my God only knows,

as one of two or just more of the same.

I wait not; instead content will I live:

much more than dreaming has my mind to give.

Sonnet 4 is my personal favorite. 

I have often felt that my art is dependent upon my emotions; the deeper and darker I wallow, the better. After all, no one really talks about a well-adjusted artist. And my reading list for English classes has never been the picture of emotional health. The dark emotions seem to be equated with "serious" literature. It's a running joke that a Holocaust movie is guaranteed an Oscar. But contentment and humor are just as real as loneliness and inadequacy. And, sorry emos, it can still produce art of just as much beauty and complexity as sadness.