Sonnet 712

Professed guardians of nature, still I fear
We have no solemn reverence for her grace;
This verdant Eden, once esteemed and dear
Downtrodden now as if mere common space.
Souls should rejoice at skies of azure blue
Or at the ocean’s breadth and mighty roar,
Yet we bequeath but grief and endless rue
That desecrates our haven evermore.
We have evolved as all things born of earth,
By blind caprice or some hand yet unseen;
We wield the power of good, yet foster dearth
And mar our place of birth through acts obscene.
Yet when our Eden’s gone, where shall we go…?
— No world in reach can best the one we know.

© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 711

She claimed some pressing errands on that day,
Her late return struck me as somewhat odd;
Lipstick slight smudged and hair fair disarrayed,
Curt smiles that seemed an awkward feigned facade.
I kissed her forehead, stroked her perfumed hair—
She stiffened when I lightly touched her arm,
Then turned abruptly, fleeing up the stairs
As if that gentle touch had caused her harm.
I mused upon the strangeness that transpired;
Then came a shower’s noise to break the gloom
While thought on thought did torture and inquire
The cause of her demeanor in that room;
Contemplating all circumstance and time…
With Occam’s razor glinting in my mind.

© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.

The Park Bench

Yes when we met that fateful day

I did not know love passed away
I should have guessed, you did not smile
But then reserve was just your style
The rest seems but a blur to me
Though in your eyes I still did see
The ashes of a love gone cold
As heavy flowers I did hold
I’m sure you spoke of how and why
But explanations drifted by
I felt the sadness crush my throat
I saw the richness of your coat
My eyes did sting but no tears fell
I heard a distant church bell’s knell
And as you stood and turned to go
I think I said, ‘you’re right, I know’
Then as you briskly walked away
I struggled with wise words to say
But mumbled sounds no sadness quenched
I laid the flowers on the bench…
© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 710

Love is a blessing, ever warm and kind
Yet like the sweetest rose, is armed with thorns;
Resplendent in rich fragrance, hearts shall find
Pure beauty decked in frightful barbs that warn.
So as a rosebud, nurtured by sun and rain,
Love feeds on smiles and tears that freely flow;
Her hidden spines protect by threat of pain—
But gently held, no harm will she bestow.
From newborn bud unto a radiant bloom
From spring through summer until snow befalls,
Fair blossoms still must bow to mortal doom
For sharpest spikes cannot deter death’s call.
Though florets thrive until the summer’s gone,
So must they bide, until by love reborn.

© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 709

True love cannot be bought nor thrown away,
It is an essence with no measured parts
Though often praised in flowery words that say,
No greater joy exists than loving hearts—
Their esse aflame in heaven’s burning light
Shine as a beacon guiding souls who share
And sail life’s seas with purpose ever bright…
Crossing oceans of time to sacred shores.
Though tempests may assail upon that course,
The staunch belief that love and life prevail
O’er every circumstance where good or worse—
With spirited hope, the winds of love push sail…
And when fate casts them on that distant strand,
They’ll walk that golden shore yet hand in hand.

© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 708

I could not love you more than here, than now…
Wrapped in your arms, alone beneath the stars;
I search the dark to find your warm sweet mouth
And close my eyes as if the moon might mar
Those deep wild inner thoughts that in me lay,
Unveiling all my heart-borne fantasies;
Nor could my softest whispers better say,
In any tongue, that this should ever be.
I feel so proud, replete in loving care—
Would that soft silver beams now show your face
And let me see the beauty glowing there,
That fortune grants I may so here embrace.
There is no human triumph more than this;
To bask in peerless love…so sealed in bliss…

© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 707

It is your natal day, I hold your hand
As surely as she did some years ago;
That moment, then as now, as full, as grand—
Love basked in dreams that only Mothers know.
Through passing of life’s years she proudly saw
The journey of her tender bud to bloom,
In quiet reverence, enrapt in awe…
Watched peerless beauty thriving, unassumed.
Now she is gone, I stand here in her stead
To shower love upon a timeless flower
And nurture still through smiles and tears soft shed—
A blossom crowned with all sweet virtue’s power.
Yet in her absence still I keep the vow,
To guard the bloom she cherished here and now.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 706

The heavens spread in smiling blue above,
No voice of wrath or thunder forewarned fate,
No sign was sent to promise guiding love;
No darkling clouds foretold celestial hate.
No birds fell lifeless from the swaying boughs,
No storm-flung bolt betrayed His presence there—
No omen, good or ill to shake my vows…
The vapored air serene, without a care;
No shadow darkened day’s resplendent gleam,
The sun shone soft, no scorching glare to chide,
As I stood mute—lost deep within my dream;
No booming voice my conscience to deride.
And as I mused, while silence shadowed me,
Perhaps cruel crimes of love—He does not see.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 705

I wooed her ear with ‘lovely flowers grow’
And followed softly, ‘love shall ever be;’
Then swept into a deep and stronger flow
Of hidden currents coursing yet unseen.
So wending on to ‘loyalty and hope,
Two hearts that float abreast as ever one
Where in such union souls shall never mope
Or stay too long beneath a clouded sun…’
Life is a golden river drawn by time
Meandering its way unto the main
With many crooked obstacles that bind;
Crags, snags and oxbows set to but detain.
Paired hearts that share true love along this course
Abide together—for better or worse.

© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.

Sonnet 704

In ink I leave my thumbprint on this page;
A shadowed thought…some idiosyncrasy,
A semblance of reason, none can gauge—
For rarely do thoughts show reality.
Abstractions are the playthings of the soul,
Mere scattered toys of ink or paint or stone;
By quill or chisel, brush or sculptor’s trowel
On naked earth these baubles so are sown;
What most survives of all our relics cast
Than artifacts that seem to transcend time,
Concepts that rise above our brutish past—
That grasp at stars which only dreams refine.
Such are the curios of the restless mind,
Small proof of life by mortal hand enshrined.

© Loubert S Suddaby.  All Rights Reserved.