Sonnet CXVI ~ Refuted

Sonnet CXVI – Refuted

Admit impediments. Love is not not love.
True minds concede the end of a marriage
They need not wait for some sign from above.
To do so would be a gross miscarriage.
We knew that our bond had long lost its spark,
Letting years pass, so sadly mistaken,
As we continued our misguided lark,
Going to depths that left our souls shaken.
Biding our time took the blush off our days,
Till it left nothing for our hearts to hold.
Years soon meant nothing for hearts gone astray,
our only reward now two hearts left cold.
     Thus we resolved the only solution:
     Our life as one became dissolution.

The prompt for NaPoWriMo.net Day 27 is to “remix” a Shakespearean sonnet. I’ve taken Shakespeare’s Sonnet CXVI, starting with its second line as genesis and using many of the lines as cues, with my ancient history. I may have written sonnets before, but this certainly feels like the first, and then only on the coattails of a master. Here is the original sonnet by Shakespeare:

Sonnet CXVI

     Let me not to the marriage of true minds
     Admit impediments. Love is not love
     Which alters when it alteration finds,
     Or bends with the remover to remove:
     O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
     That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
     It is the star to every wandering bark,
     Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
     Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
     Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
     Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
     But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
                    If this be error and upon me prov’d,
                    I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.

Image source: zedgenet.com

 

16 thoughts on “Sonnet CXVI ~ Refuted

  1. Well written my friend. Yet a sad and all too frequent a commentary. Would that Shakespeare’s words were more common in today’s state of things.
    “O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
    That looks on tempests and is never shaken;”
    🌼

    Liked by 2 people

  2. Oh my – yours is easy to identify with whereas “Love alters not … bears it out even to the edge of doom” is idealistic folly. Love is neither static nor immune to impact from all manner of destructive forces. Poor delusional William.

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