Sonnet #20

Shakespeare wrote sonnets to a lady dark
Taunting his love and coldly refusing
His eloquent longing. Still, I’ll embark
On a congruent task of enthusing
Over ice queens parading above me
As I struggle in heated battle with
Twining lines of convulsing snakes busy
Escaping being pinned to paper myths.
Revering women is a poet’s job
Not fit for muscle. I employ matter
Gray with long nights far from teeming mobs
Marching off cliffs. Cattle go to slaughter
Ignorantly, but I’ll meet impending
Annihilation, perfection chasing.

Sonnet #19

Once pruned plants shaded God’s sculptured garden,
Burbling water flowed through a channel
Sang simple songs in my earthly Eden.
Then came blasting bombs of the infidel
Shredding walls, raining bricks. My poor village
Sliced and diced, hewn by loud shrieking shrapnel
Which disregards collateral damage
For noble causes: pious, mighty claims
Of peaceful harmony, a dawning age
Ushered in. Standing before my door of shame
I’m centered by a camera lens driven
To subvert order with a balanced frame.
Gods of chaos make no hell or heaven.
What is possible we must imagine.

Sonnet #18

Vibrant traffic snakes past my stolid stance
Unaware of perfection’s clear model
Looming above this churning modern dance.
How you remain aloof to the muddle
Of ignorance slopping against pillars
Sustaining your pedestal befuddles
My intellect. Your calm evokes shriller
Sirens to increase their righteous efforts
At orderly propulsion similar
To frightened calls to stampede to resorts
Of false serenity, breaching the ledge
Feigning as restraint, driving the cohorts
Into turbulent seas. I will not dredge
the fathomless for altitude’s knowledge.

Sonnet #17

Bleached-white feathered tiara, never browned
By murky mundane dishwater blonde hair,
Rides downed long neck and ballerina
Encompassing wide-spread legs, lightly bounds
Across the sky. Stale waters linger around
Monolithic piers, wrestling livid lines
Of traffic, toiling toward their despair
Tire of hectic, meandering, ticking sounds.
I, too, intend to rise above this mire,
Embrace my fate: ready, willing and trained.
I await only your blessing on this quest,
Which I see will be denied me. The dire
Circumstances here below have profaned
Your perfection. I am what you detest.

Sonnet #16

Overstuffed couch pinioned above buildings
Floats your delicate hips and wind-raised hair
Billowing in crisp silk. So unaware,
Below your belying marble throne, rings
Seething anguished crawlers, viscous moiling
Constricted and twined on a thoroughfare
Flaked and oily, hissing sounds of warfare
Fought over you. Diamond-coiled marshalling
Slither toward plains of conflict. Be-knight
Me to slay the fuming, treasure-hoarding
Dragon at your podium’s base. St. George
Skewering scaled creatures for your delight!
Your divine profile frozen, affording
No impetus for my protective urge.

Sonnet #15

Swelling traffic searches channeling route
Weaving manic dissonance at your feet.
Boisterous action rolls and squirms indiscreet
Tangles past the solid forms flattened out
To bear your immobile shrine. Without doubt
Your presence stills surroundings in complete
Disarray. Calming frozen tone replete
With confident poise, eyes the frantic bout
Fought below for your pleasure. This battle
Among forces carelessly strewn around
To flare and hiss in spiteful, antic sound
Must elicit enjoyment. The cattle
Gathered in the corralled herd have been shocked
Into stampede. Yet you stay coolly locked.

Sonnet #14

Doll-like you recline limply, passively
Filling the draped patterns of fashion
With supple limbs, little girl ripples on
A lax tummy. On a shelf captively
Placed, someone’s possession absently
Waiting for attention. Yet your prison
Eyes smolder. Tight tangible inaction
Pouring tensile emission pointedly
Toward my breast. I stop disbelieving
The promise pinched and narrow. I succumb
To steely beams piercing my heart made numb
On cold metal offer. By complying
I take the impaling weapon to heart
And wield it as a knight to beauty’s art.

Sonnet #13

Nature becomes your willing backdrop of
Lush leaves, splashing water, clear azure skies
Composing your comfort, cushioning thighs
And shoulder from pressures. You float above
Her pleasantries: light, white disdaining dove.
Existence lives to please you. She complies
With outrageous demands. Self-assured eyes
Negate competing forms. Yours alone shove
The rest aside. Fastidious, effortless
Purity is your gift to the world. Strained
Longings of your admirers can’t embrace
Your delicacy or fertile finesse.
Earth’s bodacious womb has never contained
Seeds of you. She thrills to be your showcase.

Sonnet #12

Lovely locks of golden light float across
Urban horizons steaming furiously
Toward western success. I’m sure my boss
Tailor-suited to his business, anxiously
Taps his foot. I hear only your song gloss
Over my tight-gripped automobile, piously
Placating delirious disciples of cross-
Traffic as they fit into slots and lane,
Then part your lips gently more sneer
Than smile. Head tossed back searches the mundane
For what you know cannot exist, angel,
Among the teeming masses who profane
Your luxuriousness with their cheap chattel
I arise goddess to fight your battle.

Sonnet #11

Standing above gushing traffic, black negligee
Caresses your shadowed frame. Glistening
Sun bristles, roughly circumscribing
An aura behind modern apogee
Of perfection. Plump worn-smooth stones must stay
In place to define supple ripening
Modestly but overtly heightening
My sensual response to your visage. A
Natural reaction to synthetic
Composition. You don’t exist within
The stream you straddle. It slithers about
Your ankles, flicking, feathery, antic
Kisses, a convoluting, scaled chagrin
Never becoming apostle devout.

Sonnet #10

Pictured being photographed. Graceful twist
Of hips and head for impromptu pose, poised
For perfection parading here amidst
Fallible fools stumbling over exposed
Curbs. Unfrazzled by paparazzi, you
Brush on down the red carpet. I supposed
Your breast hardly heaved, distracted purview
Of a moment’s startling meaninglessness.
Flashing emissions can never subdue
Your glow. Combing camera candidness
For portions of your grace, they find only
what you allow. Their reproductiveness
cannot recreate your ordered lonely
charisma, just replicate wantonly.