September 17, 2007 by thegnosticpoet.

The nights are chill with clear and star-filled skies,
While days of fading summer burn with haze.
The ladies wear the latest fashion craze
To capture wandering eyes and hold their prize,
For soon enough this warmest season dies,
To leave the women robed in autumn’s maze
Of sweaters, wraps, and shawls as all the praise
Is captured by the leaves bedecked for eyes.
But even as sweet summer fades to fall
I think of you and smell the flowers bloom.
The rains of springtime freshen up my mind.
I see your shining smile and I recall
The times I’ve seen it shine within our room.
In you I’ve spring in fading summer’s rind.

Posted in Petrarchan Sonnet, Iambic Pentameter, Poetic Forms | Print | No Comments »

September 4, 2007 by thegnosticpoet.

Today I heard about your father, Jim.
I sat to write a note that might convey
My solidarity in recent pain.

I couldn’t bring myself to send those words
Like drops of blood escaped my heart and veins.
Instead, I wrote expected words of balm.

But now I sit reflecting on my day,
With nothing but the air to break the calm,
And see those formal words in twilight truth.

We fall upon the formal ways we’re taught,
Mortar between the bricks to set and smooth
And hold society together well.

For sharing pain can open unhealed wounds
And chasten out mortality to tell
Us that our time is fleet and passing soon.

Two men who lived to be near eighty years,
Two men who passed within a hand of moons,
Two men who shaped and molded who we are.
Two men are left to mourn, you and I, Jim.

Posted in Nonce, Iambic Pentameter, Poetic Forms | Print | 1 Comment »