A Sonnet Redoublé
1
All friendship survives. All rivers divert.
Puddles dry up, and I did see the sky
in your eyes for a time, but those notions
of smallness, of rightness and wrongness, can’t
come any further. I’ve worn a hair shirt
and dammed the itch and the dwindling supply
of consent to great things. My emotions
have voted unanimously to grant
full access to prosperity, no dirt
from corruption, regrets, or treachery,
no dreary committees voting motions,
no states to declare, prevent, or pervert.
I am counting by tens the glory days
when the streams that uphold us find new ways.
10
When the streams that uphold us find new ways
to account for impulses beyond mere
addictions, reactions, ho-hum lazy
factions of issues that go round and round,
the dread that passes for cleverness plays
its last notes. I need no protection here
or anywhere. Your sane is my crazy,
vice versa, no fear. I’m standing my ground
when I say adios to a life of grays.
Opposites do not attract; they adhere
like gum to a shoe, dim love to hazy
retractable hues. Jealousies confound
but will never reach the convivial
to wash over beds of alluvial…
100
To wash over beds of alluvial
sex—do I have your attention yet?—means
the either/or gasms of yesteryear have to
go. I don’t care what you did, or how they
all squealed. Your past to me is trivial.
It’s how I feel with you now that demeans
or excites or relaxes. Overdue
IOUs spoil the view, though I must say,
your original testimonial
exceeds by hundreds the usual scenes
and confusions. I sometimes perceive you
without the old placards, free of cliché,
Olympian, indifferent to old
hurt, you and I came together, a gold.
1000
Hurt, you and I came together, a gold
standard for originality, if
not quite paragons of harmony. So
much we could have done, we did.
Biologies and shouting matches sold
a few tickets, but yuck! Too many are stiff
with boredom in search of a…NoGoPro,
some safe tech magic to strap on their head.
10 x 10 x 10 lovers with great bold
outlooks surround me. I’m playing the riff
I was born to hear above not below,
dancing me to new melodies amid
a transcendent running of bulls, a flirt,
rush of sorts, divine, eccentric, alert.
10,000
Rush of sorts, divine, eccentric, alert,
I’m learning a better kind of hurry,
dawn bursting through the starting gate each day
with gentle laughter and magnificence.
Centrifugal forces who are expert
at throwing off wriggly worms of worry
spy with 10,000 eyes the best array
of what I want with sublime common sense.
An Adriatic villa or a yurt
with you and a few dozen friends, merry
are the possibilities when I say
there’s no end to the good, ladies and gents.
For ecstasy’s sake, I’m launching a phase
to new veins untapped since long ago days.
100,000
To new veins untapped since long ago days,
let us raise our glasses and celebrate
who we are: land dwelling, sea diving, sky
flying, fire breathing, fun loving starfish
of the human variety. Unfazed
by grim statistics, let us underrate
death and those who lust for others to die.
Get used to it, friend, that every wish
finds her match, comes home to greet you. Amaze
yourself and me, for once. It’s not too late!
Grow bigger than your grievances. Let lie
the sleeping pups. Be unwilling to dish
anything. Teach love’s grand tutorial,
investing through time immemorial.
1.000,000
Investing through time immemorial,
I’m spending my first million, knowing more
is on its way. You literal thinkers
need to dream subatomic. That sliced pie
of lessening returns is serial
stupidity, so needless and abhorred
by the Mind who imagines you. Blinkers
are for horses and those who never try
to overthrow their own authorial
rebellions. There’s a superior floor
of thought that takes into account stinkers
and lousy worn-out excuses for why
you’re still not rolling in riches untold.
We’re growing sums others scarcely behold.
10,000,000
We’re growing sums others scarcely behold,
which includes greenbackian euro yens.
The buck grows here where wealthy feels at home.
Chuck the shame in all its spots; they’re cheap change.
What use is approval by a glum fold
of disexpectant sheep with their dark lens
and woolly hearts? The CNNs may roam,
but not from here to eternity. Range
expands the instant I choose to uphold
more of the universal market. Friends
who dream of me, we haven’t met…yet. Loam
in the fields of the Lord is rich! Deranged
has always been the mark of a true shirt.
The shell-shocked still wander, rhyming a spurt.
100,000,000
The shell-shocked still wander, rhyming a spurt
when they feel some intestinal upset,
but never ask them to explain—oh, no,
holy writs must not be tampered with! Cheese
and purple prose know their place. Good yogurt
has a culture of its own. I can let
it abso-posi-lutely be, and go
where my gut sings. How lovely not to please
what displeases. It’s easy to subvert
when requirements are nil. A touch of fret,
I know at once that what I used to know
I have outgrown. Sleeker is my new ease
toward life, sweet poetry of these long days,
now and then hints of the epic always.
1,000,000,000
Now and then, hints of the epic always
startle me in the wee hours, choruses
of dead physicists more frisky than ten
herds of Pan’s demonia. Atheists
arm in arm with Dutch reformers, the blaze
of them is something to behold. Isis,
all the pieces of her son whole again
and eager to re-dismember. New trysts
hatching, old wars stirred to sonnetry. Days
of grief embrace relief. Now, realists,
you’ll find me catching, so beware, and when
we get to who sleeps where, bring lotuses.
I do know your shy smile and its special
unfolding, saturnine droughts, jovial.
10,000,000,000
Unfolding saturnine droughts, jovial
excesses, conversations that roll us
across the floor, clutching our bellies. More
of this, please, more! Gladly, says Universe,
who delivers in heaps, a merry ole
supersoul is He/She, an omnibus
who’ll drive us anywhere and not keep score.
I’m in the billions now, here to converse
with peers of agreeability. You’ll
know us by our success, so obvious
with markets in our hands while we explore
what lives under the limitless obverse.
Holy moly, sister, we’ve found pure gold
floods of the heart, penny stocks bought and sold.
100,000,000,000
Floods of the heart, penny stocks bought and sold
like the former wolf of Wall Street knows, brings
the kind of loose and breezy life we came
to live. We came to live, brother! Give up
with the odes to bloody sorrow. They’re old
unwearable hats for shrunken heads. Things
matter as we think, not say them. The fame
you dreaded is a feather bed, so sup
with me tonight. Let’s talk it over. Fold
that army cot; give it some good will. Rings
off the hook clamouring for your name
to spell it right on the victory cup,
enhanced with unforgettable itunes
in the Poets’ Exchange, add to fortunes.
1,000,000,000,000
In the Poets’ Exchange, add to fortunes—
go ahead, no one’s counting. (Yes, we are!)
You’ve reached your first trillion of debt-free joy,
and you’re still just beginning. Genesis
is forever. I’m germinating boons,
and so are you. Step up, please, to the bar
of eternal revelation. Enjoy
the view and the grand reviews. Exstasis
runs the show. There are hot sweet air balloons
with gondolas for two, and lots of bare
back riding, if you know what I mean. Oy
vei, that’s Moses over there! His thesis
on Exodus is done. His arc of runes
we’re holding in trust like pirates’ doubloons.
10,000,000,000,000
We’re holding in trust like pirates’ doubloons
infinite multiples of circular
stances—that’s circumstance to you and me.
Squared off no more, scared off by even less,
I slip into Creator garb. The loons
outside my bedroom cry in jocular
profusion, while fabulously wealthy
settles on my shoulders in soft caress.
I’m off to tango now, the sultry tunes
that I adore play a particular
rhythm just for me—and that gorgeous he.
We’ve all the time we want for happiness.
Outside our door, I post a true advert:
All friendship survives. All rivers divert.
100,000,000,000,000
All friendship survives. All rivers divert
when the streams that uphold us find new ways
to wash over beds of alluvial
hurt. You and I came together, a gold
rush of sorts, divine, eccentric, alert
to new veins untapped since long ago days.
Investing through time immemorial,
we’re growing sums others scarcely behold.
The shell-shocked still wander, rhyming a spurt
now and then, hints of the epic always
unfolding. Saturnine droughts, jovial
floods of the heart, penny stocks bought and sold
in the Poets’ Exchange add to fortunes
we’re holding in trust like pirates’ doubloons.
~~~
Once in a while, the urge hits me to write a sonnet redoublé, also known as a crown of sonnets, or the heroic sonnet. It consists of fifteen stanzas of fourteen lines each, “crowned” by the final stanza. Each line of the final stanza opens and ends the previous fourteen, so you have a sort of step-by-step expansion of the heroic theme.
While my style is conversational, I do pay attention to meter. I’m choosing to call this iambish pentameter. The rhyme scheme is a manageable abcdabcdabcdee.
© Elaine Stirling, 2014
Image of sunflowers comes from http://www.outdoorphotogear.com.
Oceantics 