JUNE POETRY

Better Angels

By

Ian Stewart Black

Renew the heart that ought despair,
And tearful tributes desecrate;
Commit the broken to repair,
And all that’s bare in man negate;
Let not the deepest sorrows lay,
Unweave the tapestry of grief;
To each of us, our pains betray,
And from us all is time a thief.

Seal shut the lover’s weeping eye,
Steal promised whispers from her lips;
Allotted common time to cry,
Her soul from desolation slips;
Engulf the innocence of youth,
‘Til pain nor love do we recall;
Pluck out the bitterness of truth,
Make better angels of us all.

Love Letters

By 

Ian Stewart Black

                                    I

Adrift am I without my paramour’s
Sequestered touch: departed from my bliss, 
My eyes desirous of a distant shore
That bears to me once more my lover’s kiss.
The seas that censure me dissuade me not
From your exalt, I brook their heavy toll
With pride: so that in time I may be brought
To you, and in so doing feed my soul.
Let not the ocean’s wrath disquiet you,
My sail is love against the humble seas;
And should the old gods bid our love undo,
My heart shall raze Poseidon to his knees.
So onward, to my mistress’ arms I sail:
Against the boundless deep – love shall prevail!

                        II

In parting, we benight so fair a day.
A dimmer world is this, bereft of dawn
And dusk, and even stars have fled astray
In this illumeless world, for you are gone.
All life has fallen into disrepair,
All creatures still in silent slumber wait;
And neither thrush nor blackbird fills the air
With song, for they have little to elate.
The sunrose sorrows in its solitude,
Bewailing such a darkness as to be
Without end; all forms beauteous subdued,
For they endure in loneliness for thee.
But even as the world resides in gloom,
Forever shall my love remain in bloom.

                       III

Thy passion hast the appetite of Fire.
Alive with lustful hunger, thou enshrine 
A virtue oft denied: intense desire
That sets aflame this wintered soul of mine.
The Waters of thy blood, vermilion red,
In service to thine yearning heart do speak!
All manner of erotic things unsaid
Abound amid the lustre of thy cheek.
In thou, the Earth assumes a form
Most wonderful and most divine, wherein
Humanity is but a play performed
To veil divinity upon thy skin.
Sweet Air bestows its essence unto thee,
And in thy kiss, thou breathest life to me.

                       IV

A beautiful deceit performed in all
Our finery: life is a masquerade.
We flourish in our act, and we enthral,
But every sequin wrought to glisten fades.
Personas shelter us in timid youth:
Another’s name, another’s masque adorns
Our brow. But time demands of us a truth,
Veneers and pageantry are promptly worn.
Thy masque relinquished for the want of love,
Reliant on thine own essential grace:
Thy rapture tore my veil and stripped me of
Disguise, revealing true love’s fairer face.
Deprived of sequins and thy falsehoods fair: 
I love thee all the more, thy soul laid bare.

                       V

My Muse. I would that every sonnet bore
Thy name, and all my poetry revered
A love supreme amid this suitor’s lore
Of decadence and lies – a love sincere.
My Light. In you, the shadows of my soul
Are banished for devotion and delight:
In you, my deepest sorrows are consoled,
And for the reverence of you, I write.
My Love. For love without you is a word
Of artists’ fantasy, a trifling thing:
A gilded monument to all absurd
Delusion. Without you, love is nothing.
Enlaced in every vestige of my art
Is you: the rightful Queen of all my heart.