The bounded sonnet, like an angel, sits,
Surrounded by that cloying light, upon
The silver song that feeds, and folds, and fits
And lifts the lyric high. The verse – thus drawn
In distant lilts through that Empyrean
That, just beyond the Primum Mobile
Of thought, and sense, and will, and waking din,
Remains the source of verse, a crystal sea –
Shines through the spheres, its meter chained in air,
Its rhyme encased in light. As angels sing,
So does the poet write; yet scribing there,
He slips the crystal, and his verse takes wing.
The sonnet steals away, and thus set free,
It cannot be but that which it must be.
3 comments:
Wow. Wordsworth and I know not how many other of our honoured predecessors wrote tributes to the sonnet. You have admirably joined their ranks. I still drag my feet at attempting such a thing, as yet feeling too inadequate to successfully honour that dearly beloved form. I like yours.
It was the one by Keats that put me of a mind to do this. At first, I wasn't sure, but then I decided I liked this one well enough.
The one with that erotic reference to sandals befitting the "naked" foot of poesy? He and so many others found difficulty with expressing their full sentiments in the lofty Italian form. But so far as I can see, it has not really an equal in the definition of being "the most exquisite form of poetry" if properly executed(which latter I do not know that I can yet claim I do.). Even if it has a competitor, I am too dearly enchanted by it to change just yet.
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