I prefer the original definition of the sonnet as a "little song" to over-rigid formulas. These are my favorite sonnets of my own composition, sonnet translations, and other lyric poems.
I know nearly all of the poems/songs in this post, and what a truly fabulous collection it is - all top class! Trying to pick just one to restack is a very difficult task, but I have chosen "Leave Taking" because it was started when you were only 15 and already has your poetic voice, and also because I have written a poem bearing the same title.
I think "Leave Taking" is one of my best early poems, and it's also the concluding stanza of "Jessamyn's Song," my first long poem. I like to think it shows that I had some natural talent, as well as the dedication to stick with a poem for 50 years before publishing it!
The women were pretty skillful in tearing off the head of Orpheus. After they threw it into Thracian Hebros, it remained in good voice all the way down to the sea near Lesbos. Opera singers used to spray rheir throats with ether. Dionysus picked girls who were skilled at decapitatio.
I know nearly all of the poems/songs in this post, and what a truly fabulous collection it is - all top class! Trying to pick just one to restack is a very difficult task, but I have chosen "Leave Taking" because it was started when you were only 15 and already has your poetic voice, and also because I have written a poem bearing the same title.
"Brilliant leaves abandon battered limbs
to waltz upon ecstatic winds
until they die.
But the barren and embittered trees,
lament the frolic of the leaves
and curse the bleak November sky ...
Now, as I watch the leaves' high flight
before the fading autumn light,
I think that, perhaps, at last I may
have learned what it means to say—
goodbye."
I think "Leave Taking" is one of my best early poems, and it's also the concluding stanza of "Jessamyn's Song," my first long poem. I like to think it shows that I had some natural talent, as well as the dedication to stick with a poem for 50 years before publishing it!
The women were pretty skillful in tearing off the head of Orpheus. After they threw it into Thracian Hebros, it remained in good voice all the way down to the sea near Lesbos. Opera singers used to spray rheir throats with ether. Dionysus picked girls who were skilled at decapitatio.
I'm glad I stuck to poetry!