A Dream, A Kiss: The Stranger’s Tale

I met a man who told me tales of wand’ring

long on lonesome trails of silvered hazel wood,

where by a stream he dreamed, and his pond’ring

 

the ships he sailed, and battles fought as he could.

Then how his dream seemed more real than all of this—

of his darling’s kiss, how missed, and what he should

 

have done. Now old, I think of his dreamed kiss,

his plans altered and rued. I instead stayed,

cast wishes on waters true, finding bliss

 

with you, I thank that man, his lesson taught,

grateful my hopes granted in love long sought.

 

Another sonnet for dVerse, this time in Terza Rima, with thoughts, too, of enjambment, per Jilly’s post. I’m still reading the sonnets, and I’m so impressed with the philosophical questioning. I seem only to be able to write these narrative type sonnets. This started out as a poem based on a Yeats challenge, Jane Dougherty did a while ago. If you want to read that version, it’s here. So indirectly, this is inspired by Yeats. Feel free to comment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Visitation–Sonnet

When misty twilight shifts to midnight black

then I fear to hear her mournful sighing

outside the window, cries of “bring me back”–

whispers first, but then intensifying.

 

Who is this spirit whose cries so haunt me?

What darkness of the soul fights through the night,

flutters about a flame as if to plea,

fleeing as dawn awakes, sheds rosy light,

 

wondrous–I see but her ghostly image

in her darkling visitations to me,

confusing, the purpose of the scrimmage

of our spirits, hers dead, but not set free.

 

Still, now I know when next she comes again

the light will fade for me–not why, but when.

 

For dVerse, where Björn has asked us to write a sonnet. I find sonnets very difficult to write. This one follows the Shakespearean rhyme scheme, and I hope the meter, too, but with an added twist of gothic sensibility.

 

 

 

NaPoWriMo: Seek Not the Golden Apples

How do I wander? Through crowded city street,

with hazel wand in hand, or sailing roiling seas,

seeking golden apples of the sun, finding defeat,

wondering the gods whose hearts I must appease.

The glimmering girl has vanished, forever in the past

her heartaches muted grief in throes of fitful slumber.

The blossom of youth soon goes, beauty does not last,

time journeys on, carrying our destined number.

Yet I realize that dreams change, they come in many forms,

as starlight reaches us, and its reds shift to blue,

as heroes stay the course through life’s constant storms,

I see rainbows now in the changing hues.

So we’ll float together, our raft on time’s stream,

we’ll love, be together, and share a dream.

 

NaPoWriMo, Day 25  Today’s challenge–to use a line from a poem. I attempted a sonnet here, which was a prompt from a previous day. I used phrases from Yeats’s “The Song of Wandering Aengus.”

You can also listen to it sung here by Judy Collins.

Golden Apples show up in many myths, including one of the tasks given to Hercules.