Sonnet: The completed loop
As to my aims I go for sonorous,
Rising at times to Falstaff’s forgetive*:
That soft gee, there, hard proof I’m serious,
I picked it up, it helps the narrative.
I’ve stripped decades of ancient memory,
Unlayering facts that cover other layers:
Pity, self-love and youthful misery,
A funless helter-skelter down the years.
The bare bones of a hollow threnody,
The ragbag sound of rhyme and integer,
Both given form and sense – a rhapsody –
By virtue of my silent listener.
I talk, we talk, it is our tendency,
But being heard is our necessity.
* A good sherris sack... makes (my brain) apprehensive,
quick, forgetive, full of nimble fiery and delectable shapes. Henry IV, part two
I hear you. Always.
ReplyDeleteThat is lovely RR. You do melancholy well. Sent me packing to the dictionary too.
ReplyDeleteWhat about listening?
ReplyDeletedid you add that asterisked Falstaff quote or did I completely miss it last evening?
ReplyDeleteThe Crow: Always present - like death and taxes.
ReplyDeleteMikeM: You're not going potty. The footnote was added later. It seemed to me that those who didn't know the etymological root of forgetive might imagine it was "to forget" rather than "to forge". Hence the entirely uncharacteristic belt and braces.
At your implicit suggestion I am now going straight to YouTube and choose the best version I can of Come to Me, My Melancholy Baby.
Pity, self-love and youthful misery,
ReplyDeleteA funless helter-skelter down the years
Ha. That's me. On a good day.
"Forgetive". A familiar feeling word that would not fit the context with my knee jerk interpretation of it. Ran to Falstaff/wiki to see whether Falstaff was forgetful, then on to the dictionary. Threnody was new to me too, and now the sherry/sack connection.
ReplyDeleteLuce: Well, all I can say, is you use fantastically good make-up.
ReplyDeleteMikeM: I fear I've made reference to that Falstaffian soliloquy at least a dozen times in my blogging career. A love of Henry IV, Part Two, was all I took away from my my miserable high-school education. It left a deep impression. And if you haven't clicked on Lady Percy's glorious speech to her father-in-law from the same source (there are facilities for this in the first line of my home page self-introduction above) I beg of you to do so and, if you have the time, please comment your reaction.
What worries me - and yes it truly does - is that these references should be thought of as (a) showing off, or (b) educational. It's true I do show off most of the time but not on this occasion. Nor do I seek to educate - that would be hypocritical. Only to expose others to the passion.