By God I swear—you gave your life to me;
And well you know that I would die for you—
What greater bond than such fidelity,
What proof remains that love must still pursue?
Though mortal breast can never outlast Time
And beating hearts must one day come to rest,
Our spirits shall live on in love sublime,
Forever jointed at God’s divine behest.
It is my hope that we shall carry on
And bide in Heaven with our love supreme,
So I may yet your beauty gaze upon
And souls entwine in never-ending dreams;
The stars shall mark our resting place above—

No Hell shall bar this timeless, endless love.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

When I behold the nascent buds of spring
Breathe life to ragged branches dead and grey,
When feathered songsters on fresh breezes sing,
And bring bright hope unto a newborn day;
When rays of warmth fair rout retreating snow
And winter’s dragoons yield unto new reign;
When vessels bearing life do start to show
Dear swelling fruit that shall a world reclaim.
Then ever do my thoughts return to you,
Sweet vernal countenance to melt all hearts;
You gift the world with love’s enduring hue
And with a simple smile pure joy impart;
As ancients venerate the waxing sun,
So shall I you—until our song is done.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

Why should I pander to sad critics lame
And to some unnamed failure beg my worth?
What line of rhyme has ever borne their name,
What measured thought gave their opinions birth?
Why suffer censure from some petty pen
That feels no fervor in another’s ink,
Condemning lines that braver minds commend,
Or striking down what they could never think?
Why pageant skill to mediocrity,
Or seek applause from hearts that know no art?
How can a dullard yet with brilliance see,
When envy casts dark shadows o’er their heart?
Let bards be judged by words they fairly writ
And not by fools that never penned a whit.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

Though eyes may never scan these fading lines,
And tongues may never speak the truths they hold;
Though Heaven may not bless what hope designs,
This rune may yet survive as stories old.
Preserved on yellowed parchment from this age
In need of knowing eyes to speak again;
To stir some unknown soul, and so engage
And touch what human vestiges remain.
Once, lost in time, a man a beauty loved,
And worshipped her on high with force supreme;
But though his heart with peerless passion moved
His heartfelt pledge was ruthlessly demeaned.
What matters to a love that lasts all time,
If it lies etched in unrequited rhyme?

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

No, I had not prepared myself for Death,
Although I knew that he would one day knock
Upon the door of life; I felt his breath
When the door opened—a clammy shock.
Yet I welcomed him in and poured a glass;
He drank it down, looking suitably grim.
“So who have you come for today?” I asked;
“Why your father, of course—I’ve come for him.”
“But he is far too young,” I did protest,
“His meager life has barely just begun.”
“That matters not to me,” he did confess,
“I claim them all—those souls, both old and young.”
“But no! Not him! Not him!” I did implore—
He took him by the hand….and closed the door.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

I did not watch them shovel dirt on him,
After he was laid in the cold black earth;
Surrounding faces seemed so wan and grim,
Staring at the blank ledger of his worth.
Though hymns were sung, were none I do recall,
No words the preacher said rang clear, not one;
Someone mumbled something, and tears did fall,
With grey heaven above and a wizened sun
Looking down on black ants, that moved in mime.
I recall only sadness that day in June,
And many cheeks blanched by hot sweat and brine,
A world numb with voices out of tune;
A feckless god in an amorphous sky—
And eyes bled red when all the grief ran dry.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

I found a path forged through a nameless wood,
O’ergrown from seldom travel it appeared,
Where man or beast of purpose surely could
Still plumb those depths of claustrophobic fear.
Though bramble choked and dark, it still called out
To dauntless travelers that might give it heed,
Where every step it’s thronging vines would flout
And block swift passage with its barb tipped green.
What purpose then could such a trail once serve,
And for such service, who would blaze it there?
To navigate those depths, what might I learn
Of unnamed motive lost to disrepair?
Would journey such to sate a curious mind
So justify the thorns there sure to find?

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

These tears of ink fall silent on my page,
Scribing too wan face in crooked lines;
Black inkwell there of depths no pen could gauge,
No words there writ to yet this grief confine.
‘Tis here my heart spills out its blackened stain
Now marked as blemished smudges on my sleeve,
And at my desk a crumpled man remains—
A soul undone, not knowing why you’d leave.
There is no God above, no God stands tall;
Or if there is, he chooses not to hear
This suffering love-torn man who gave his all,
And cherished so, the one his heart held dear;
Still I implore blank heaven in sorrowed ink,
As love and life in hopelessness now sink.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.