A sonnet is a form of rails and bars

And not much like the gossamer spider’s web

A foursquare scaffold toward the circling stars

An angled answer to high tide and ebb

For Nature never tamely interweaves

In calm susurrus of alternative

But storms and swirls ‘till rampant Chaos grieves

The blows that she lacks time and task to give

While should the poet spend force, force to show

No blood is shed;—yet forcéd falls his lay,

His every effort effortless to go

Succeeding mere exertions to convey.

We cannot mimic Nature, do our all;

‘Tis artifice that is most natural.

******************************

I pick up pen and, weeping, start to write

The ink is blood of wounds I must display

That seneschal, awake all through the night

Has patient watched my tears fall for this day

When tears will tell their tale and take their toll

Tell all, ‘till all their trial and toil be done

That soft report that echoes in the soul

Yet leaves me unconsoled, consoling none

For when I’ve squared the circle of my pain

I find myself no closer to the cure

By flowered words, truth is deflowered again

I’ve written, to be sure, or—be unsure?

Art is dishonored, used as heartache’s whore

And life dishonored too, by one line more

******************************

We think that feeling must be where we start

Wise Aristotle’s first primeval Source

Of movement, moving mind and mouth and heart

So speak our feeling—wind up feeling worse!

What cart is this we’ve put before what horse?

Does passion lie? Or truth lie somewhere else?

Where does love run when love has run its course?

Has honesty, or poetry, played false?

Perhaps the fault lies neither in our stars

Nor in ourselves, but in this Fallacy—

That strong emotions, and emotions’ scars

Set us in motion; when the truth may be

That motion pulls emotion in its wake;

We move, and moving, love the step we take.

Mark Simos is Assistant Professor of Songwriting.

He notes of this work:  ”This trio of sonnets, tossed off in a playful imitation of the style of the Metaphysical Poets, was inspired by discussions with students in various songwriting and lyric writing classes in the past few years. Though these may read as poems about poem-making, they concern questions that plague contemporary songwriters and musicians as well: Is structure inherently ‘cool’ and artificial? What is the role of our emotions as inspiration for our creative work? Does artistic authenticity depend on the depth of our feelings in the moment inspiration strikes? Can a work of art express thought as well as feeling, and still be affective and not didactic? The last sonnet alludes to the idea that “motion creates emotion”, a ‘meme’ I associate particularly with conversations with Pat Pattison. (I can’t say for sure who first came up with it—especially after a quick Google search showed it in use by cold call marketing trainers and aerobics instructors among others! But I’d like to acknowledge Pat and my fellow teachers in the Songwriting Department for many provocative discussions on these questions.)

Go to sleep, my little tabby cat

I love to watch you on my kitchen mat

Sleep, your head between your outstretched paws

Dreaming of those mice

Between your little jaws

Dream of mousies if they’re what you crave

And we shall plant a little mouse’s grave

Cat and mouse, just God by another name

So sleep, my little tabby—sleep and dream

Sleep and dream

Go to sleep, my lovely little house

Big enough to hold both cat and mouse

To span both poles, the souls of man and wife

To hold both happiness

and sadness, death and life

Sleep, my little house in Watertown

Though we both know that someday you’ll burn down

House and town, just God by another name

So sleep, my little house, then—sleep and dream

Sleep and dream

Go to sleep, my little nation-state

With a stomach-ache from all the oil you ate

Filled with houses, people, cars and pets

Synagogues and churches,

mosques with minarets

How long you’ll endure it’s hard to know

Kropotkin thought you’d crumble long ago

But ‘til you face the final twilight’s gleam

Sleep, my little country—sleep and dream

Sleep and dream

Go to sleep, my little planet Earth

Made of seas and deserts, rocks and dirt

Your skin tattooed by nations’ borderlines

Each a boundary that

both separates and joins

A choir of nations that your praise could sing

So sweetly, were we only listening

Gaia, Goddess by another name

So sleep, my little planet—sleep and dream

Sleep and dream

Sleep, my little Sun that shines so bright

For day is just far brighter sun starlight

Sleep, my little Sol, and have no doubt

The day will come when you’ll

go nova and burn out

We planets at your side will be consumed

But how can we be sad that we are doomed?

Every star, just God by another name

So sleep, my little Sun, then—sleep and dream

Sleep and dream

Go to sleep, my little galaxy

Twirl your spiral arms so valiantly

Blaze into the endless black expanse

Where you and all your brother

galaxies do dance

Dance and sparkle, little fireflies

Each a flame that’s born, goes dark and dies

Repeating one more of God’s many names

So sleep, my little galaxy—and dream

Sleep and dream

So go to sleep, my little tabby cat

You are a universe, imagine that!

With old star embers in your amber eye

So I’ll sing you—the universe’s lullaby

Sleep, my little universe and friend

Each song makes the world begin and end

Every song, just God by another name

So sleep my little tabby—sleep and dream

Sleep and dream

Sleep and dream

Copyright 2004 Mark Simos/Devachan Music (BMI) — All Rights Reserved.

Mark Simos is Assistant Professor of Songwriting.