It’s been a long time since I wrote a song.
I used to write beside the bay at night.
The music made me feel much less alone.
Night shadows forced a lashing, screaming fright.
Music was comforting. I’d sit and write
Until the sun wove light forms on the sea.
Then dawn would bind the shadows. I was free.
At last my music grew completely clear.
Then shadows shattered every pitch and rhyme.
They scream and dance. No note can stop my fear.
My loneliness grows with the measured time.
The shades are odorous. They smell like brine
The sea has tossed with rotting fish and shell,
Or like dead music, a stillborn dream or tale.
Sondra Ball (deceased March 17 2010) touched the lives of many with her passion, spirituality, intuition, outspokenness, and love. Born in Kentucky to migrant workers, an active Quaker and child of the Creek Nation, Sondra was passionate about race relations as well as the environment. An accomplished and passionate poet and writer, Sondra published the online poetry journal, Autumn Leaves, where she took great pleasure in encouraging new voices, especially among children and Native Americans. Sondra has been published many times in several anthologies, E-zines, journals and sites, such as Canadian Zen Haiku canadien ISSN 1705-4508, Matrifocus, Poetry of the Desert ISBN 0974197548, Spirits in Peace (see Richard Doiron) and Sonnetto Poesia.
This sonnet is pre-published with the permission of the Editor-in-chief from:Richard Vallance, editor-in-chief. The Phoenix Rising from the Ashes: Anthology of sonnets of the early third millennium = Le Phénix renaissant de ses cendres : Anthologie de sonnets au début du troisième millénaire. Friesen Presse, Victoria, B.C., Canada. © 2013. approx. 240 pp. ISBN Hardcover: 978-1-4602-1700-9 Price: $28.00 Paperback: 978-1-4602-1701-6 Price: $18.00 e-Book: 978-1-4602-1702-3 Price: TBA
300 sonnets & ghazals in English, French, Spanish, German, Chinese & Persian
30 sonnets in this anthology are to be pre-published by our permission in Poetry Life & Times (UK) which has exclusive sole rights prior to the publication of the anthology itself. Readers may also contact Richard Vallance, Editor-in-Chief, at: vallance22@gmx.com for further information.
http://vallance22.hpage.com/