To the Bedrock of Ballads....Three Sonnets

 Last month, because it was my turn to lead our Writer's Group meeting, it was up to me to choose the homework topic. The assignment: Write about something near and dear to you.

The 'Something near and dear to me' I chose to write about; keeping Rhythm and Rhyme alive in poetry and working at perfecting its art! 

Forbid, that we without remorse stand by

To watch the Bedrock of Ballad decay

Where echoes of Past’s half-mad mortals lie

Preserved in poetry unto this day

…for roar of words that warred within their breasts

They did not choose, but were chosen for this;

To pen, with metered yen, the soul’s requests

While siblings slept in unencumbered bliss

…the poet wrestled with vessels of thought

To tame the tempest as it seared and surged

And sparred with impotence of what was not

Until the will of quill and query merged

To spill, unfettered to the quest of rhyme

And poetry that stands the test of time

***

Forbid the Master-grid of poetry

Should crumble in a noisy corridor

Where groan is not honed into symmetry

But heaped on trays nobody hungers for

As, sacrificed on altars of free verse

The sanctity of poetry is lost

For freedom without law can be a curse

And words reduced to ash, its sorry cost

Because there is no protocol or code

To set off’rings of letter-art apart

They fall, like flower-petals to a road

Where foot-traffic tramples on works of heart

But where the ancient authors gave their all

The poetry of cadency stands tall

***

Forbid we don the popular veneer

Of free speech, forgetful of consequence

Darling, the end of all of us is near

Then, all that will remain is recompense

For ink, in the heaven of passion spilled

Where filament of penmanship, my love

Endures long after heart and hand are stilled

The wherewithal of madrigal to prove

When dust-to-dust reclaims its ordained Must

When love and lust that steers us is annulled

Pray, what will flutter in the wake of trust

After the soul from Frame of Name is culled

I wonder if, in some far yet-to-be

A piece of us will live in poetry

© Janet Martin