it’s funny
how faith
ebbs and flows in me
right now
it is at low tide
God does not exist
nor spirit
nor afterlife
nothing
the only thing
that seems to be
beyond myself
is my love for you,
and your love for me
and that lives
only in you
and in me
We will die
no one will ever know
how irreplaceable it was
it will just be gone.
I thought, one day, I wrote a thing of beauty.
Later on, when taking it in hand,
And sharing it with those, as was my duty;
Neither they, nor I, could understand.
The virtue of a verse is that its meaning,
Often may completely hidden be.
And God, it seems, prefers a lack of gleaning;
With His truth revealed more cryptically.
I thought I could, from Heaven, feel Him looking;
Sung my hymn about it, none could hear;
Though none would deign to join me in my brooking;
Never did a votary appear.
I read, again, my words much later; and
I finally began to understand.
Once I wrote a thing
I thought very beautiful.
I read it later.
Did not understand.
All its meaning was hidden
From me and others.
The virtue of verse
Is that its meaning may be
Completely hidden.
God seems to like it,
Almost always, done that way.
He watches it all
From above. I saw
Also, and sung about it,
And no one heard me,
And no one sang back.
I listened very closely,
And I heard nothing.
I read it again
Much later; and finally,
I understood it.
One thing for certain
You can tell what is going on here
Without punctuation
Gaze upon me, O Lovely, and beware,
Or as thy frosts unfairly come, rejoice.
Fair-play with fortune will confound Despair
That, hideous with pride, hath shown its voice.
For never-resting, God’s anointed here
Excel: to verse thy numbered days, to bear
This hell, and lend thee summer; pray to year
Thy days, and keep thee and thy children fair.
In they, our seasons, prisoners are we–
As checked, and sapped, and pent: as tyrants fear
All eyes the beauty we distil may see–
Who gift these days to winter they who sneer:
Though thieving Time all substance yet destroys,
We left thee more than wretched He enjoys.
This sonnet is part of a short, or
possibly at some point, very long
sequence; click here to read it all:
Could, fine as you, another woman be,
Who surely has no equal on the Earth?
Could there have been some perfect virgin birth
Which consecrates impossibility?
Could there exist a worthy bond, as we
Have formed, through such a perfect sanctity?
Could one unearth a work of art, so free
Of flaw as you? The Angels would decree:
God made the Earth; one miracle was done,
And then within His realm did he make two.
No wonder of the world could have begun
Until the Great Almighty God, who knew
His Miracle, complete with only one,
Created me, and gave this gift to you.
This sonnet is part of a short sequence; click here to read it all:
Sister-love, and wife
Thou, my greatest joy in life,
Art worth every strife.
David Emeron: Sonnets 