A Sonnet for Serenity

[mneme]

A Sonnet for Serenity

First quatrain and last couplet by Joshua Kronengold, second quatrain and following couplet by batyatoon, first couplet (5-6) and editing by thnidu.

Deny me answer to my heart's behest,
Deprive me of my property and lot,
Remove my person, force me by duress,
To where the land shan't bear me, I care not.
For I am unencumbered by oppression,
Nor canst thou wrest the sky from my possession.

Though I be exiled to the endless dark,
And though they tell the world I'll not return;
Though thou may'st fan the flame or set the spark
That seas may boil and that the land may burn;
My will's my own, and so the skies shall be --
And neither wilt thou ever take from me.

Now nowhere can I be, since Peace I found,
But mine is that which lies above the ground.

Comments

[thnidu]

Aha! I just realized why the verse structure seemed so familiar: It's the ending of a Shakespearean sonnet (with an extra foot in its first line... not its mouth).

• shant
→ shan't (not that Willie the Shake would've cared)

I like it.

[mneme]

Exactly correct, sir.

The extra foot was a rewrite error, I'll admit.

Hmm. Ah!

Deny me answer to my heart's behest!

[thnidu]

Good!