I love sonnets - a neat and succinct verse form with a rigid pattern, either Shakespearean or Petrarchan, that forces the poet to make his choice of words perfect. The following are by various superlative sonnet-writers 8)
| TRUCE, GENTLE LOVE (Michael Drayton) |
| Truce, gentle love, a parley now I crave |
| Methinks 'tis long since first these wars began |
| Nor you nor I the better yet can have |
| Bad is the match where neither party won. |
| I offer free conditions of fair peace |
| My heart for hostage, that it shall remain |
| Discharge thy forces here, let malice cease |
| So for my pledge thou give me pledge again. |
| Or if no thing but death will serve thy turn, |
| Still thirsting for subversion of my fate |
| Do what thou wouldst, raze, massacre, and burn, |
| Let the world see the utmost of thy hate: |
I send defiance, since, if overthrown, |
Thou vanquishing, the conquest is mine own. |
| SINCE THERE'S NO HELP (Michael Drayton) |
| Since there's no help, come, let us kiss and part |
| Nay, I have done, you'll have no more of me |
| And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart |
| That thus so cleanly I myself can free. |
| Shake hands forever, cancel all our vows, |
| And, should we meet at any time again, |
| Be it not seen in either of our brows |
| That we one jot of former love retain. |
| Now at the last gasp of Love's latest breath, |
| When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies |
| When Fate is kneeling by his bed of death |
| And Innocence is closing up his eyes - |
Now, if thou wouldst, when all have given him o'er |
From Death to Life thou mightst him yet recover. |
| SONNET CXX (William Shakespeare) |
| That you were once unkind befriends me now, |
| And for that sorrow, which I then did feel, |
| Needs must I under my transgressions bow |
| Unless my nerves were brass or hammer'd steel. |
| For if you were by my unkindness shaken |
| As I by yours, you've passed a hell of time; |
| And I, a tyrant, have no leisure taken |
| To weigh how once I suffered in your crime. |
| Oh! that our night of woe might have remembered |
| My deepest sense! how hard true sorrow hits |
| And soon to you, as you to me, then tendered |
| The humble salve which wounded bosoms fits! |
|
Mine ransoms yours, and yours must ransom me. |
| THOU ART INDEED JUST, LORD (Gerard Manley Hopkins) |
| Thou art indeed just, Lord, if I contend |
| With thee; but, sir, so what I plead is just. |
| Why do sinners' ways prosper? And why must |
| Disappointment all I endeavour end? |
Wert thou my enemy, o thou my friend, |
| How wouldst thou worse, I wonder, than thou dost |
| Defeat, thwart me? Oh the sots and thralls of lust |
| Do in spare hours more thrive than I that spend, |
| Sir, life upon thy cause. See, banks and brakes |
| Now, leaved how thick! laced they are again |
| With fretty chervil, look, and fresh wind shakes |
| Them; birds build, but not I build, no, but strain, |
| Time's eunuch, and not breed one work that wakes. |
| Mine, o thou lord of life, send my roots rain. |
| BATTER MY HEART, THREE-PERSONED GOD (John Donne) |
| Batter my heart, three-personed God, for you |
| As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend; |
| That I may rise, and stand, overthrow me, and bend |
| Your force, to bend, blow, burn, and make me new. |
| I, like a usurped town, to another due, |
| Labour to admit you, but, oh, to no end. |
| Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend, |
| But is captived, and proves weak or untrue. |
| Yet dearly I loved you, and would be loved fain, |
| But am betrothed unto your enemy. |
| Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again, |
| Take me to you, imprison me, for I |
| Unless you enthrall me, never shall be free, |
| Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me. |