What will you do when you read this sonnet?
Will you smile and think of “Shakespeare in Love”?
Will you moan how I shouldn’t have done it,
frowning like a spurned date suddenly shoved
from the dark car? I think of Keats in his
wild surmise, dreaming deep of Fanny Brawne,
waking in his oppressive wheeze, his bliss
lost to his consumptive cough at stark dawn,
knowing he nears the end. He used to fear
he’d never become a poet. Now he’s
legend. But he knew of loss, how to tear
up parchment when image failed. How to please
the Muse also. I hear voices outside
my window. Feel distant planets collide.
Roger Armbrust
March 15, 2018
