Do You Doubt That?

“O' dear Vicar, how rue you this fine morn?

Well and loved, all free of sun-slept regrets?”

From your mouth, the sweetest scent

of suffering, the silence of a lamb

slaughtered by light of the soft-spent night.

I read the grief of the sharp sham,

the quiet morning mockery

your mother's eyes twinkled, a clue

of a love's widowed nunnery.

From the shade of the poisonous yew

I whistled bright “O Father, mindful

of the love,” my own misshapen'd

ode to the contemptuous soul

of a sinner so well requited.

“O dear 'phelia, how bruised and torn,

so like love's caged cigarettes...”

What madness they speak of

was only you drowning

in the politics of men--

father, brother, and lover's

bent for making hay of others

unsounded misery--

the burning bridges

of a life cloistered

from the maiden's gay

insouciance.

Ken e Bujold

© 2022

Reviews

[poetgurl]

“O dear 'phelia, how bruised and torn,
so like love's caged cigarettes...”

Such remarkable imagery here, this is amazing

[Ken e Bujold]

thanks SW. amazing what you can come up with in hunt of a rhyme :)

[poetgurl]

what do you mean? did you read some of my writes?
: )