Love Sonnet
By V. Valentine, with a bit of help from Aneni Soren
Firdance@aol.com

Some say it is a rose, some say a flame

That burns all day and night, without a pause,

But to me, their remarks are all the same.

I know it is a beast, with iron claws.

I saw her, and the rose did slowly bloom

Within my heart, and I thought all was well.

I did not know that this would spell my doom,

Into the fiery depths of flaming hell.

I saw her every day, and every night

I thought about her even in my sleep.

I wondered if the time, here, now, was right,

I was afraid my feelings were too deep.

The flame was burning, eating at my spirit,

The thorns? Their pain is too small to remember.

I whispered a love song, in hope she'd hear it,

I almost wish the flame would die to ember.

I waited too long. She turned to someone new,

A man I knew, and hated. Claws of steel!

Emotions, screaming, tore me through and through,

So I decided, simply, not to feel.

I built a wall of ice around my mind,

My spirit was encased in a cocoon

Woven of dark, and night, things of the kind

That in the light do vanish all too soon.

It numbed my pain, although I paid a price,

(A price too great for any man to pay.)

Because of walls of iron and of ice,

My love has vanished, stolen, flown away.

I could not protect the one for me,

So I was cursed, destroyed, ruined, defiled!

And in my dreams and nightmares, all I see

Is my love, mourning for her child.

Some say it is a flame, some say a rose,

A waterfall of kindness, the wind's breath,

This is not true. Listen to one who knows:

Love is pain, and all it brings is death.