On The
Overcoming
A Sonnet
William Stapleton
A Sonnet
William Stapleton
His feet shall gain no purchase on this earth
whose road in life was never pocked by pain,
or who, securing passage and a berth,
not to his peer or better stood the bane.
Although in aim we cast our selves aside,
the will to power; to best is ever strong.
And fear we shall, those ever who deride
each noble try to mankind to belong.
But He is ever near Whose life,
call we upon His name to bear,
shall move us beyond fear and strife.
And where He reigns true man prevails
and death and dearth pass fast away
His mighty wind fill up our sails.
Techincal
Note: This was an attempt at the
Italian Sonnet, 14 lines, wherein the rhyming pattern is ABAB CDCD EFE
GHG. The octet (the first two
quatrains) states the problem, and the sestet, (latter two tercets) provide the
resolution. In a further attempt to bend this form just a bit, I kept the octet
to the traditional 10 syllables, but reduced the sestet to lines of 8 syllables
each.
whose road in life was never pocked by pain,
or who, securing passage and a berth,
not to his peer or better stood the bane.
Although in aim we cast our selves aside,
the will to power; to best is ever strong.
And fear we shall, those ever who deride
each noble try to mankind to belong.
But He is ever near Whose life,
call we upon His name to bear,
shall move us beyond fear and strife.
And where He reigns true man prevails
and death and dearth pass fast away
His mighty wind fill up our sails.
On The Overcoming by William Stapleton is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.