Some thoughts on the Sonnet 4

A fourth look at the sonnet

In this fourth look at the sonnet & its many variants I would like to look at eight more interpretations of the form. Starting with Lyly, they are in a chronological order. All of them have their own distinctive flavours, so to speak, & individual merits. Again, it may be questioned if all of them fall into the category that we like to think of as designated the sonnet. I will leave you to decide that for yourselves.

John Lyly (?1554-1606) grandson of the noted astrologer William Lilly was educated at Magdalen College, Oxford & also at Cambridge. This sonnet is taken from his prose comedy Campaspe.

Cards And Kisses

Cupid and my Campaspe played
At cards for kisses, Cupid paid;
He stakes his quiver, bow, and arrows,
His mother's doves, and team of sparrows;
loses them too; then, down, he throws
The coral of his lip, the rose
Growing on's cheek (but none knows how);
With these, the crystal of his brow,
And then the dimple of his chin:
All these did my Campaspe win.
At last, he set her both his eyes;
She won, and Cupid blind did rise.
O Love! has she done this to thee?
What shall (alas!) become of me?

The volta starts with the tenth line. Note the odd AABBCCDDEEFFGG rhyme scheme. I would hesitate to rhyme the third & fourth feminine rhymes with the masculine ones of the fifth & sixth, but I think the similarity is intentional.



To many William Blake (1757-1827) needs no introduction. Virtually unrecognised by his peers & thought a bit mad by the Victorian poets as a whole, he is now recognised as one of the founding fathers (if not the founding father) of the romantic movement. As far as anyone knows this is his only sonnet. The lion in the twelfth line reminds us we are in the strange hallucinatory world that the poet invented, a world that I often term 'Blakeville' & reminds us we are not in the eighteenth century London of its author.

To The Evening Star

Thou fair-hair'd angel of the evening,
Now, whilst the sun rests on the mountains, light
Thy bright torch of love; thy radiant crown
Put on, and smile upon our evening bed!
Smile on our loves, and while thou drawest the
Blue curtains of the sky, scatter thy silver dew
On every flower that shuts its sweet eyes
In timely sleep. Let thy west wind sleep on
The lake; speak silence with thy glimmering eyes,
And wash the dusk with silver. Soon, full soon,
Dost thou withdraw; then the wolf rages wide,
And the lion glares thro' the dun forest:
The fleeces of our flocks are cover'd with
Thy sacred dew: protect them with thine influence.

It is difficult to ascertain if Blake actually wrote this as a sonnet. There is no discernible rhyme or volta & the metre varies considerably. Although the use of enjambment in particular makes me feel that he wrote this as a sonnet. Note the alliteration & how Blake often combines this with rich sibilants.



Frederick Goddard Tuckermann (1821-73) was born in Boston, Massachusetts & practised as a lawyer. He was a long term correspondent with Alfred, Lord Tennyson whom he eventually visited in 1855. He is known for his variations on the sonnet form. Many of these sonnets were not published until 1931.

'Not The Round Natural World, Not The Deep Mind'

Not the round natural world, not the deep mind,
The reconcilement holds: the blue abyss
collects it not: our arrows sink amiss
And but in Him may we our import find.
The agony to know, the grief, the bliss
Of toil, is vain and vain: clots of the sod
Gathered in heat and haste and flung behind
To blind ourselves and others, what but this
Still grasping dust and sowing toward the wind?
No more thy meaning seek, thine anguish plead,
But leaving straining thought and stammering word,
Across the barren azure pass to God;
Shooting the void in silence like a bird,
A bird that shuts his wings for better speed.

This is from Sonnets, The First Series. He is undervalued for some of his great innovations to the form. He uses a syncopated stress against the pentameter in this poem that is very reminiscent of some of the work of G. M. Hopkins. The rhyme scheme is essentially a free one but could be seen as: ABBA BCAB DEFC FE. The volta is between lines 9 & 10. Note the excellent utilisation of assonance & alliteration.




James K. (Keir) Baxter (1926-72) was born in New Zealand & educated at the University of Otago & in Christchurch & Wellington. Despite dying at a comparatively early age he was a prolific writer. His interpretation of the sonnet is an interesting one. This is from his Jerusalem Sonnets cycle (addressed to his friend Colin Durning) from 1970.

The bees that have been hiving above the church porch
Are some of them killed by rain --

I see their dark bodies on the step
As I go in – but later on I hear

Plenty of them singing with what seems a virile joy
In the apple tree whose reddish blossoms fall

At the centre of the paddock – there's an old springcart
Or at least two wheels and the shafts, upended

Below the tree Elijah's chariot it could be, Colin,
Because my mind takes a little fire there

Thinking of a woman who is like a tree
Whom I need not name – clumsily gripping my beads,

While the bees drum overhead and the bouncing calves look at
A leather-jacketed madman set on fire by the wind.

Baxter had an interesting spiritual & colloquial style mixing Biblical imagery with elements of the Maori language to create a very individualistic form.



Sheenagh Pugh was born in Birmingham (England) in 1950, educated at Bristol University she now lives in South Wales. She has a subtle and adept technique with a great sense of humour. Sometimes there is an interesting analytical detachment to her work.

What If This Road

What if this road, that has held no surprises
these many years, decided not to go
home after all; what if it could turn
left or right with no more ado
than a kite-tail? What if its tarry skin
were like a long, supple bolt of cloth,
that is shaken and rolled out, and takes
a new shape from the contours beneath?
And if it chose to lay itself down
in a new way; around a blind corner,
across hills you must climb without knowing
what's on the other side; who would not hanker
to be going, at all risks? Who wants to know
a story's end, or where a road will go?

This is essentially an extended philosophical rhetorical question in the guise of a sonnet. Similar in form to the musings of much of Pugh's work, not unlike her famous poem Sometimes featured in the collection Poets on the Underground (famous works of poets are often featured on the walls of the tubes of the London underground system). Almost epanaleptically she ends the poem where it started, back on her metaphorical road. Apart from the couplet there is no real forced rhyme scheme, unless you accept some of her skilful partial or near rhymes. The one or two instances of rhyme, such as go & ado, or corner & hanker feel very organic & unforced. Where she cannot rhyme she has used assonance to good effect. The volta seems to be at the start of the third stanza in traditional Shakespearean style.



This next poem is a form developed by Allpoetry's very own Eric Lee (dericlee). It is an interesting & innovative evolution of the sonnet. Eric has named it the Mythic Sonnet. This is because first & foremost it has to have a mythological or mythic theme. There are three quatrains followed by a couplet of iambic pentameter in an ABBA CDDC EFFE AA rhyme scheme. The last two words in the couplet are exactly the same as the first & last A rhymes in the first quatrain. This is an integral feature of the mythic sonnet.

In The Fairie Ring
©2001 by eric lee

Shine on, Oh Shepherdess of stars, cold light;
invoke thy spirit’s pow'r upon our dance!
Recall to our fond dreamings true romance
as we cavort in this sweet ring of Night.

Oh, Moon, thy gentle beamings guide the waltz
that carries upward our adoring gaze
to sable skies. Oh! Stole of softest haze
that graces thy fair shoulders in those vaults.

Thou gem uncut! Thou bright and gentle hand
that sweetly shows the steps we lightly tread,
grant surcease from the garish Sun’s hot dread
and softly shine upon our fairie band.

Thou, fairest of the faces of the Light
make Magick shine on this, our Solstice Night!

There is a skilful use of alliteration used in conjunction with assonance in this poem. Palatal & fricative phonemes are blended together to give this sonnet an almost timeless feel & appearance. Note the utilisation of antiquated contractives, spelling & pronouns to heighten this effect visually.



This is an example of another interesting sonnet form known as the Vaughanet. This was invented by the American writer Marcy Jarvis, our very own ea & another member of the Allpoetry family. She has named it after her maternal family name & with a nod to an illustrious ancestor Henry Vaughan (1621-95) the famous English civil war poet. A feature of the variant is that the couplet is at the fifth & sixth lines immediately after the first quatrain & there is some form of near rhyme employed in the poem.

Commanders Of The Realm

The irises that overlap the pond
in lavender with fringe at throats of white
sequester golden tongues that mute the sound
of lilies coaxing insects to alight
and crawl into their fragrance to ensure
another squad of irises next year.
We pass them as I row around the rock -
the otters will make foodstuff of their shoots;
the cranes that wade are feeding on the stock
that nestle in amongst tenacious roots.
The pickerel weed salutes our silent boat
as water lilies march along the sides
but irises stand regal like a coat
of arms that yet command nature presides.

Note the couplet near rhyme of ensure with year. This is a very mellifluous sonnet with some beautiful rural imagery & utilises what is essentially an English rhyme scheme.



Last but not least is a poem from the Allpoetry communities' Mercedes Webb-Pullman who goes by the pseudonym of Pania. A talented New Zealand writer she has adopted the style of her compatriot J. K. Baxter for this sonnet.


Home is the City

The shadow dapple of breeze-tossed leaves
is easier to bear than earthquakes.

It’s such a little city to hold so much:
reef taniwha stares, cold shoulders awash.

Follow their footprints from sea to peak to stars
where words weave heart to home and never leave.

From mountain top look down on Lego lines
at night, in strings of diamonds tossed, that shine

about the streets where writers walk, as if
the city is still building from their dreams

while overhead the satellites stitch time
and place together, grandmother’s crochet.

Back on the beach, the echo of waiata
insists you listen. Here. Hear, and hush


Written as a slight satire on the non-inclusion of aboriginal poets on the poets walk this starts with a line reminiscent of Gerard Manley Hopkins . Although it does not have a traditional rhyme scheme there is an excellent use of near rhyme & assonance. There is an instinctive almost innate use of sibilant sounds which gives us the sound of the waves crashing on the beach as we reach the final couplet. This is further compounded by a wonderful weaving & synergetic mixing of native words with postmodern cultural references.

In my next look at the sonnet I will include the Pushkinian sonnet, Percy Bysshe Shelley & Sir John Suckling.

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Bibliography

The New Oxford Book of English verse: Ed, Helen Gardener, OUP.
The Critical Sense: James Reeves, HEB London.
101 Sonnets: Ed Don Paterson, Faber & Faber.
The Oxford Companion to English Literature: Ed, M Drabble, OUP.
William Blake: Selected Poems, Ed, P.H. Butter.
Sheenagh Pugh: ID'S HOSPIT, seren, Poetry Wales Press, 1997.