A sonnet I wrote probably three years ago

The following sonnet, from my Odes, Epigrams, & Further Sonnets, was written a few years ago. It's a straightforwardly Shakespearean sonnet: the iambic pentameter is fairly strict throughout, and the rhyme scheme observes the Shakespearean abab cdcd efef gg format, although it has to be conceded that one or two of the 'rhymes' take a certain amount of liberty with the concept of rhyme - thinking in particular of "pot pourri/Furies".

Although the mood is Autumnal, nevertheless I think it answers to the catastrophism of present times.

XV

Reflections upon an Indian Summer

Were I acidic like Dryden or Pope,

I’d dip my feather in my stinkpot’s bile

and fish out defamation, hangman’s rope,

lewdness, deceit, profanity and guile.

For this autumnal balm’s but seasoning,

Pandora’s snowflake snuff-box pot pourri,

essence de con en poudre; stuff fools fling

on rancid lamb. Come winter, the Furies

will dog the path across the waste, the pound

collapse, and legions of the destitute

follow the piper into the cursed ground.

This Autumn, though, it still looks pretty cute.

Season of fleeting calm, of phony war,

of warning signs we tactfully ignore.