Elan Garfias (19)
A Sonnet, or Something Very Near to One
My heart did sail as steady craft
When I could yet command its rudder.
I saw in thee the coming draft
That has my heart now set a-flutter.
Douse’d by the hurricane,
Weathered by the storm,
I wonder if the searing rain
Might give this feeling form.
Yet what if all’s not lost, but learned?
I ponder, scaling mast.
This brig of mine, so tossed and turned
Is righted now; hold fast!
I’d here the routine couplet set
If thou wert just routine:
Twelve lines thus marshalled oft beget
A bounteous fourteen.
And when I often pause and blink—
How to couch the question?
Three quatrains are but few, I think,
To vouch for my affection.
But lo to feel the thoughts break free,
Damning distance, scorning time,
Casting off that ordered rhyme
ABAB.
Still I offer thee my art.
If it be bad then pawn it,
For what I feel within my heart
Fits not within a sonnet.
Quick! Set love’s harbor as your goal
And quit this tempest, wrathful, vile.
Speed swiftly on past reef and shoal.
Heed but the beacon of her smile.
Neither dactyl nor stanza nor rhythm nor pun
Packed neatly by some metered scheme
Will make me a Shakespeare, Marlowe, or Donne,
Nor capture quite the way thy russet eyes gleam.
Poetry then, comes to naught,
But preserve thy visage as my vice
Till such time as our lips join, hot,
I hope these verses might suffice.
Further,
Two couplets now I think are owed.
And if this one should fail its load
I prithee stomach one more line:
Wouldst thou be my valentine?
Moontide Heresy
Would that the sun might stay its flight,
That dawn come not to chase the night,
That mind and bosom, burning bright,
Should rapture and salvation be:
A kiss betwixt serenity
May’t not from holy flame alight.
I found my altar on thy breast,
There amidst we faithful pressed
In worship of the soul undressed.
To thee I render sacrifice
And breach the fledgling paradise:
Thy cheek upon my chest.
Pray this happy moon persist
To tarry in this fragile tryst.
To leave an inch of thee unkissed
Would crime against the heavens make,
Should e’er thy body cease to quake
As fervor, fleeting, fades to mist.
Oh Morning wake me not I pray!
Her eyes beseeched me scorn the day
Lest darkly savoured passions fray.
Take not what she to me bestows.
I bid but vainly; plainly she goes
As I against first light inveigh.
Let hence thy sheath and sacristy
Become my hallowed heresy,
My gospel, borrowed Valkyrie.
Give angels pause, may old gods harken:
Ne’er shall I till skies should darken
Renounce they breath, my piety.
Elan Garfias is a 19-year-old voice actor and aspiring writer from Los Angeles, where he's currently in the process of acquiring a history/Spanish degree. In his spare time he can be found reading, monologuing in various languages, and pacing canyons in search of the perfect rhyme. You can follow his endless pursuit of beauty and a good cup of coffee @elangarfias.
A Sonnet, or Something Very Near to One
My heart did sail as steady craft
When I could yet command its rudder.
I saw in thee the coming draft
That has my heart now set a-flutter.
Douse’d by the hurricane,
Weathered by the storm,
I wonder if the searing rain
Might give this feeling form.
Yet what if all’s not lost, but learned?
I ponder, scaling mast.
This brig of mine, so tossed and turned
Is righted now; hold fast!
I’d here the routine couplet set
If thou wert just routine:
Twelve lines thus marshalled oft beget
A bounteous fourteen.
And when I often pause and blink—
How to couch the question?
Three quatrains are but few, I think,
To vouch for my affection.
But lo to feel the thoughts break free,
Damning distance, scorning time,
Casting off that ordered rhyme
ABAB.
Still I offer thee my art.
If it be bad then pawn it,
For what I feel within my heart
Fits not within a sonnet.
Quick! Set love’s harbor as your goal
And quit this tempest, wrathful, vile.
Speed swiftly on past reef and shoal.
Heed but the beacon of her smile.
Neither dactyl nor stanza nor rhythm nor pun
Packed neatly by some metered scheme
Will make me a Shakespeare, Marlowe, or Donne,
Nor capture quite the way thy russet eyes gleam.
Poetry then, comes to naught,
But preserve thy visage as my vice
Till such time as our lips join, hot,
I hope these verses might suffice.
Further,
Two couplets now I think are owed.
And if this one should fail its load
I prithee stomach one more line:
Wouldst thou be my valentine?
Moontide Heresy
Would that the sun might stay its flight,
That dawn come not to chase the night,
That mind and bosom, burning bright,
Should rapture and salvation be:
A kiss betwixt serenity
May’t not from holy flame alight.
I found my altar on thy breast,
There amidst we faithful pressed
In worship of the soul undressed.
To thee I render sacrifice
And breach the fledgling paradise:
Thy cheek upon my chest.
Pray this happy moon persist
To tarry in this fragile tryst.
To leave an inch of thee unkissed
Would crime against the heavens make,
Should e’er thy body cease to quake
As fervor, fleeting, fades to mist.
Oh Morning wake me not I pray!
Her eyes beseeched me scorn the day
Lest darkly savoured passions fray.
Take not what she to me bestows.
I bid but vainly; plainly she goes
As I against first light inveigh.
Let hence thy sheath and sacristy
Become my hallowed heresy,
My gospel, borrowed Valkyrie.
Give angels pause, may old gods harken:
Ne’er shall I till skies should darken
Renounce they breath, my piety.
Elan Garfias is a 19-year-old voice actor and aspiring writer from Los Angeles, where he's currently in the process of acquiring a history/Spanish degree. In his spare time he can be found reading, monologuing in various languages, and pacing canyons in search of the perfect rhyme. You can follow his endless pursuit of beauty and a good cup of coffee @elangarfias.