Sonnet 5

I've lately taken to writing sonnets - Petrarchan rather than Shakespearean. No doubt this follows on from my completion of The Montpeliad (619 line heroic couplet satire of the follies of Bristol, modelled on Pope's Dunciad).

I've written five or six sonnets in this latest frenzy. So far one or two have seemed slightly shallow to me; one or two slightly better. Sonnet 5 below is highly topical, given that I'm writing this post on the eve of the Referendum. I think I'm quite pleased with it. It doesn't sound too trite to my ear.

Sonnet 5

The tide’s edge where, lurking between the ebb

and flow, flip-flop between each absolute,

this moment when affairs become acute,

you lounge on your divan with your Black Leb.

At least you’re reading up on politics:

Ryan, who lectured you at UCL.

You really thought tonight you might as well

Here, history bifurcates. Some ratchet clicks.

That slouching beast of Yeats, or evil twin

of beast, pauses for breath in Beit Sahour. 

Rancour develops between fastest friends,

fools prick eachother’s effigies with pins.

Someone like Kissinger extends a claw,

and Eliott’s whimper signals when it ends.