7. Suicide Sonnets

(Sonnets)

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1

This night's as black as misery in bloom;

   Just staying here and waiting out the hours

Have crushed the wits of better men; my doom

   Lies on the edge of fate; what once was ours

To keep and cherish now lies in the tomb

   Of love to hatred turned, freezing the flames

Of passion to the ice of scorn and gloom,

   Adding my name unto the list of names

Bereft of friendship, loyalty and love.

   And so this lonely pilgrimage commences

Within these dark and turning ways: above

   The moon shall guide, below the foul offenses

      Of countless sinners goad me on I know

      Not where or wherefore in these hours of woe.

2 *

The souls of poets dead and gone do mock

   This drifting shadow moving slow along

The lonely streets, and when I hear them talk,

   I hear my name in whispers to their song:

"Dear Shakespeare's such a daft, an aging songster,

   Who writes so sweet the craft of sweet surrender;

But little does he know his regal youngster

   Is simply but a show, a great pretender.

Oh when will Shakespeare see that his dear love

   Is but a falsity he cannot move?

Such love can steal his art from realms above

   And break his weary heart that cannot prove

      Unto his waning hopes that love is true:

      Ah! See how much he mopes his pains anew?"

3 *

"Dream on, you sad and brooding dreamer, dream

   And take with you the prooding tears you shed,"

They say in laughing spite, "and go redeem

   Them for a single night in someone's bed.

Far better shall you be to steal away

   And end your woes for free in harmless fun,

Than suffer needless pain to rue the day,

   Forgoing every gain for things undone.

For then and only then can you begin

   To take a happy pen to make you whole;

So heed our one advice to heal in sin,

   That through an act of vice, you'll save your soul!"

      What blasphemy is this that makes no sense?

      Such temporary bliss makes no defense!

4

I wander to and fro this endless night,

   Alone to find a place within a world

Of bitter pain that seems a tragic plight,

   A pilgrimage with all my hopes unfurled.

I look upon the stars as pilgrims did

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   Of old, continuing my wayward path

On weary limbs, as helpless as a kid

   Who's lost a dearest friend to Fate's cruel wrath.

I think of laying down my shattered self

   In some dark alley, dying slowly, death

Releasing me from love's corrupting pelf **

   With one last exhalation of my breath.

      But still I live, for graves have not a place

      For suicides that die in such disgrace.

5

Although I walk the grounds of Hell and sin,

   With thee I walk the heights of heaven's bliss;

I languish by the places thou hast been,

   Alone to weep afresh and reminisce.

In reminiscing thoughts of thee, I shed

   An ocean full of sorrow's deep regret

And suffer countless boils of molten lead

   To pine away so deep a loss in debt.

The world of life, a world so full of hoping,

   Is dead without the strength of friendship's clasp

To hold this breaking heart, and leave me moping

   So high a cost that death can little grasp:

      The fount of sweet forgetfulness won't cure

      This agony, in which I can't endure.

6

If I'm to die tonight by chance or by

   Mine own design, so be it water lined

With poison running down my throat or die

   A thousand deaths too vulgar for the mind,

I'd gladly die a thousand deaths in Hell

   To free myself from this most hellish ache;

I'd pay the ransom of a king or sell

   My very soul to get this grief to shake

It's ghastly clutches off my heart!

   Oh no! If I just had a heart to get

Possession of that organ, I would part

   Those very clutches off without a sweat!

      Ah! Such an ache compels me to dismember

      My ribs and rip it out to quell the ember!

7

Am I at fault to love? How can this love,

   So dear to me, have eyes of piercing truth

That see with eyes of piercing hate, or move

   This mortal heart to suicidal ruth?

What thought or word or deed could justify

   So sick a love that only death could cure?

What cure so strong that Hell should rectify

   This curséd swain in death? What nail so pure

In Christian blood could strike so strong a stab

   Of palpitation, that to die is bliss

Upon a crucifixion's splintered slab,

   That dying death becomes so sweet a kiss?

      I pray to God Almighty, kill me now,

      And on my wretchéd soul His balm endow.

8

What eyes hath scornéd love implanted in

   My head, that every object offers sweet

Surcease from sorrow's awful bile of sin?

   What feet are these that lead into the street?

When I do look upon a brick, I see

   My brains and blood upon its cornered edge,

And looking on this quill, I must agree

   'T would better suit to ink my bloody pledge

Upon the living parchment on my neck;

   And looking on a horse's reigns, I reckon

Of strangulation's medicine to break

   My curséd neck and drag my corpse, which beckon

      The beasts of earth to feed upon each shred,

      Because without thy friendship, I am dead!

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FINISH