Sonnet 22

Come, bind me to you with your pensive eyes;
Those eyes that promise pleasure through the nights,
Ever to raise me up on passion’s tides.
Mind how you lead to ever greater heights.
Now, bind me to you with your luscious lips.
Words fail you not, but do you honour sir;
In that you warm me with your clever quips
And whispered words that ever prove a lure.
And bind me to you, for your gifted hands
Are captivating me with tempting touch.
My heart has followed you to many lands;
Heart-stopping when your fingers prove too much.
Then bind me -- eyes, lips, hands -- without a sound
For I am here to serve you, I'll be bound.

Sonnet 21

I hear your voice in public, and your measured words
Remind me that we must, the busy world, deceive.
I know your voice in private, when your whispered words
Reveal to me the wicked passion I’ll receive.
I feel your hands in public, and your gentle touch
Is reassuring me that I am not alone.
I know your hands in private, where your heated touch
Excites responses unlike any I have known.
I feel your lips in public, and your tender kiss
Whispers against my cheek; a manner that’s so chaste.
I know your lips in private; how your passioned kiss
Can stir my very essence with our salty taste.
Come, share your love with me, my only heart’s desire.
Your voice, your hands, your lips, have all set my blood afire.

Sonnet 20

How can the world conceive itself complete
While it stays unaware that we are one?
Your eyes speak volumes when our gazes meet.
‘Tis meet that we have shared our tale with none.
We feign disinterest that’s nearly cold;
A lie that, on the surface, I accept.
Your touch expresses passion well controlled
Within a shell of silence, sternly kept.
The sweetness that you offer me has fed
Such dreams as are unfit for prudent ears.
Your lips say nought, and nothing need be said
Though we’ve not been together many years.
In silence will I plead for my delight:
My friend by day; my greatest love by night.

Sonnet 19

My life was dark; ice filled my veins and soul.
I’d never even known the warmth of praise.
My heart was frozen hard; that took its toll
As I had been untouched by Helos’ rays.
But then his path did change; he followed mine.
I felt his touch and then I sensed a thaw.
To me, the world seemed strangely new-defined
By what I smelled and tasted, heard and saw.
His rays caressed my skin, which warmer grew.
The warmth became a fire which burned within
Yet I’d not quench it -- though it burn me through --
For playing with fire could not be a sin.
Though I may burn, vanish without a trace,
Aflame, I float when warmed by his embrace.

Sonnet 18 - an echo sonnet

Look on my ceaseless efforts, haughty one,
(Haughty one,)
And see how you would wound me with your vain
( You're vain!)
Negligence; tell me, when will you be done,
( Be done)
Glorious love, treating me with disdain?
( With disdain.)
Hear my fervent pleas, my feckless one.
( Feckless one,)
Only give me a moment to explain:
( Explain)
Look on my face and tell me why you shun
( Why you shun)
My love. I'll not rest until my refrain
( My refrain.)
Engages you. I'll stay in Albion
( In Albion)
'Til the end of time and I would remain
( I would remain)
Only yours, sweet Charity. If I won,
( If I won)
Worthy soul, I would be with you again.
( You again.)
Eagerly I will wait 'til unison.
( 'Til unison,)
Refuse me; you will find I'm all undone.
( I'm all undone!)

Betrayal

And away from the sonnet sequence again! This poem (written a year ago) was a challenge from a friend of mine. She provided the end-words, and I had to fill in the rest.

I only delve into my thoughts by night
For fear that my face reveals them by day.
I trust you to warn me, my dearest friend,
For I would hide my thoughts from my enemy.
I would not wish to hurt those whom I love;
I would not wish to cause pain to my lord.

I confess I am uncertain of my lord.
He rarely comes to me to pass the night.
It seems he has no desire for my love.
He is courteous but distant by day
Sometimes I wonder who is my enemy;
Sometimes I wonder who I can call friend.

I could never doubt that you are my friend;
You help me see the good things in my lord,
You helped me identify my enemy.
It is only when I am alone by night
That I doubt all I have learned by day;
That I doubt all I thought I knew of love

As a child, I dreamed I would marry for love.
Did you not do the same, dear friend?
But now I have small pleasure in my day.
No matter what dishes I prepare for my lord,
He refuses to eat them, night after night,
Taking only food made by my enemy.

For we are taught: unto your enemy
You must offer your forgiving love.
I struggle with this as I pray at night,
For whom can I love but my one true friend;
For whom can I love but my legal lord.
Gladly I take up duties through the day.

I embroider in the solar by day
And do my best to dodge my enemy,
Who is no more than a spy for my lord
And also his mistress. I see your love
Of food is thickening your waist, my friend.
Are you sure that's where my lord spends his night?

Each day follows another lonely night.
Pray take the enemy away, my friend,
So I will not see my lord with his love.

Sonnet 17

If you, my dear, were guardian of the sea that roars,
Subjecting my poor island to your pounding waves,
This choice I could have: yielding to your flood that pours
O’er me, like the deluge, or to retain my ways.
Immovable though I may seem to you, I fear
Becoming so immersed it makes my life seem dim.
O take not my unwav’ring life from me, my dear.
Hold me, and do not drown me, as I learn to swim.
Above all else, I fear that I would cease to be;
Retreating from the battering force of your great tide;
When, with a quaking movement, feel you smother me.
Attempts to stand my ground all stem from hollow pride.
Of all these petty fears I have that could come true:
Far worse to learn you love me not, as I love you.

Sonnet 15

Hmm. I'm not thrilled with line two, but will leave it for now ... until my inner editor surfaces one day (I have a feeling that it's not far off) and I'll whip through all the problems in the verses and get them closer to what I want.

I gaze at you from ocean’s chilly depths
And see you doing stretches by the shore.
I noticed that you seem to shift your steps
To push yourself to reach a wee bit more.
I gaze at you from cloudy threatening skies
And watch you as you take your daily run,
And when you lift a weight for exercise;
To train yourself for heavy lance and gun.
I gaze at you from dullest hillside stones
As you ride by upon your war-trained mount;
But you’re preparing for the foes well known
Who tilt to mark the day of Royal count.
From ashes I have told you what I see.
Pray tell me sir, what do you see in me?

Sonnet 14

A paradise for fools? What thing is this
That mocks the rules that I was always taught?
While foolish acts mayhap could win a kiss;
Such acts, for heaven’s reward, avail me nought.
If what I’m told of Paradise is true,
‘Tis filled with fools of a most virtuous type
And, while I hope I’m not as bad as you,
I trust I bear not that angelic stripe.
If what I’m told of foolishness is fair,
It is a pastime that’s reserved for wits
And, though I am no brain, I would not dare
To claim that I’ve not scored my share of hits.
And, thus, it is a foolish yarn I spool
Within this paradise reserved for fools.

Sonnet 13

Enough of this modern stuff -- back to 1582 and the sequence.

You carried me away to Ludgate Hill,
For Lyly’s play, put on by Oxford’s men.
‘Twas “Sapho”, and his voice was rather shrill;
Small wonder Phao left her quickly, then.
You bought me books of verse with hard-earned coin
And claimed, each time, you thought of me throughout:
While all the sundry flowers of Gascoigne
Were eaten by the sheep of Colin Cloute.
You poured a ruby wine into my cup
And drank to friendship that we had begun;
We took our seats, relaxing as we supped.
‘Twas hours before our feast was truly done.
What can I give, that you might think was clever?
Accept my words, and you shall last forever.