MetricalSonneteer

I wrote this one with Shakespearean rhyme, and a slight volta in line 9. Like all of my non-Petrarchan sonnets, even if I do push the volta down, I'm used to some form of a turn, whether thematic or otherwise, at that point.

Just to explain:

"Sincere" comes from "sine cera" - "without wax". In the old days, they filled up statues' cracks with wax, so it melted on a hot day. That's when they came up with "sine cera", to mark honesty rather than a trick.

"Sine qua non" means "without which not" - ergo, the absolute necessity for something, as in "by definition". Some claim that prose becomes poetry when it has some form of planned rhythm, so planned rhythm is poetry's "sine qua non".

Your sculpted figure might stand beautiful –
But wax can be shaped into anything;
What breasts may have, covers the head of null,
Deceiving, like your love, your hot, blunt sting.
A solicitor’s hand, a statesman’s word
Have more sincerity than you have care
Or empathy – ‘she bothered not her world
With frequent sacrifices made for her’.
Your statue stands erect upon the window.
I’ll pass, committing to my own affairs:
Renounce that love of yours which had me widowed,
Fragile, like in a game of ‘Truth or Dare’.
‘Sine cera’, but you shall melt anon:
Perhaps, though, wax is love’s sine qua non.

Poetical

Hi there Jonathan,

I thought this piece by you was teriffic, very nice writing indeed, and as you have explained it; I think the ending was brilliant. though I do like the way you explained rhytme is the back bone of poetry. good stuff and well done!


Paul

lanaia74

Totally AWESOME!

MetricalSonneteer

Thank you!

Sonnet 48, the "other half" of this one, the way I like to see it, to be uploaded soon, probably on the "romantic" section. As for planned rhythm being the backbone of poetry, I do not agree with that statement fully, but certainly hope that these days, poetry will start drifting back to that direction, especially the "metric" path...

Cheers,
Jonny

MsJacquiiC

LOL - the "metric" path indeed ----> Wow!

Such a beautiful writing, though the subject matter is about the cynical antithesis of love...

Nevertheless - a beautiful sonnetic tribute to the late-great Shakespeare - I'm sure he would love this piece for it's poetic value. He may even like the way you compaire love to wax perhaps... Possibly love being anything but shapeable, maleable....

Great share - Surprising that it comes from a depressed 16 year old :hmy:
Thanx for sharing it with the Community

Jacquii.

MetricalSonneteer

Dearmost Jacqii,

Thanks for all the praise. You won't find a work by me that is not metric, I reckon... If there is one traditional poetic requirement I believe to have mastered to a "sufficient" level for publication - it would be metrics. I know lots about rhymes, but have to think them out every time, the same with images, alliteration et cetera.

I think you've taken my abilities a little overboard (), but yes, I think that Shakespeare - eager to show-off his Latin skills and sporadic, cynical, somtimes ditzy view of love - would know and hopefully appreciate what I mean here by renouncing love. Ever read Sir Thomas Wyatt's sonnet "Farewell love, and all thy laws for ever"? I wrote an Elizabethan sonnet similar to it, and you'd be surprised how indifferent it is to this sonnet, which really is not very cynical. I'd say it's more of a lost-trust approach.

As a 16-y.o. who's read Keats - the last thin I enjoy writing is something which has been written before countless times. Even in eternal depression (maybe sometime I'll post a depressed poem of mine), as much as I'd like to write teen-angst, I know how pointless it is, and why I should toss those pages away. I always aim for a fresh argument.

Cheers!
Jonny

stardust

HI JONATHAN!! WOW!! I love it!! You indeed, have so much TALENT at a young age. You have the whole future ahead of you. It is true Inspirational and so well-written. I´ll keep reading it on and on...Sincerely, Stardust.