Sonnet 290

I’ll not presume to tout to you my love,
Who knows the mortal tenor of my heart;
Yet would beseech to know the path above
That could exalt the baseness of my wonted part.
Audacious lips would publicly proclaim
My debts to you, but for the echoes’ scorns
At how I steal a blessing off your name:
Dishonor yours when such with you adorns.
Impatient screams from unrequited soul
Teach you to sing in foreign tongue obscure
To auditors, and I will you cajole
Till lust for you with you is filled and pure.
     Until within does nought but you abide,
     Cheat death, sweet silence; rest my sin of pride.

Sonnet 58

Had I but all the oceans mined for pearls
To circumscribe thy temple’s graceful bust,
And mined the veins of earth by groveling churls
All harvesting the ore of all kings’ lust...
Had both my hands the language learned to speak
Of touch whose comfort turns to ecstasy,
And I a wily tongue to havoc wreak
Upon thy heart a true love’s fantasy...
Had I but stock to bless a mother’s womb
With nature’s darlings wearing thy sweet face,
And castle them secure from fate and doom
Where they should blossom forth to crown our race
     My heart for us would weep unsatisfied
     Till thou and I in Him be unified.

Mothers Day for Orphans

I never sank beneath the threat of “Mothers‘ Day”
And thought I couldn't grieve what never had.
But vicar-like could bask around the moms.
I'd even taste the doting wren's small brood,
And smile to see her feed and coax that charge
And laugh when wobbling out they flew and claimed
My own this syndrome of an empty nest.
For having served and fortified their rook
Some weeks, these fledgeling pilots, now aloft,
Had graced me with some sacred motherhood
And vernal hope at their three maiden flights.
My tactical support now done, I left
Them free to touch and soar and thought
Them gone. Until at last one moseyed by
Within triumphant, well-clenched feline maw.
So back and forth my neighbor's day he spent:
Their down and life, my mother's heart he rent.

For thirty years I thrived without a child
Content with dozens, scores, or hundreds;
My some-time orphans I could pamper for a year or two
And nurse their bruises, mend their wings for flight.
The windows boarded now impart no light;
A dusty altar sports uneaten crusts.
Perceiving these, I too lose appetite.
An unparishioned priest, shall I yet bake?
Why waste in oven one more stick of wood?
Mon Pere, do I such wretched mother make
That I must learn to do without a brood?

New Sonnet - To My Mistress the World

They say, my Lady, thou art now betrothed,
     
     

Sonnet 276 - For Parchment Painted Valentine

My heart was never thawed by searing fire,
For flames should never reach to where it hides.
But hints it satisfies thy love’s desire
Are rays from orb where vernal melt resides.
This form ne’er knew the ecstasy of flesh
Bestowed by yeasty drink or lusty touch
To offer up such view of Heaven fresh
As thee emprisoning me in greedy clutch.
I shall not mourn that Pleasure me depart,
Or know a pall as she is burièd
If thou’lt vouchsafe her course in thee I chart
And thy heart’s joy by me be carrièd.
     For thee now melt the shards within this chest
     As pleasure o’er my touch sweet sighs suggest.

Sonnet 1001 - Response to Shakespeare’s #1

Whate’er shall he who spies the brightest eye
Presume to ask in way of higher grace?
Shall dully mortal gaze be heard to cry
That henceforth hea’en to him reveal her face?
Instead bestow on this unquenched soul
A draught from out the only I to rain
Such tears of joy as widow would console,
A beam that would on desert life sustain.
For if unworthy I this eye admit
To be, then must the cruelest hoarding shrive
When glorious beauty ’neath a bushel sit—
It would all souls salvation now deprive.
     But blessed by thee, my joys o’erfill this cup
     Which eye shall beckon all with me to sup.