So, God, if your existence should be proved
I’d still insist that I would not bow down.
No matter what, I never would be moved
To genuflect before your thorny crown.
No, worship’s no thing for a human being
To get mixed up in. Any risk I take
Is very much a worthwhile hazard, seeing
That dignity and freedom are at stake.
It’s rumoured you became a man once – well,
If you should come again and stay a man
I don’t think I could possibly foretell
What good you might do in your natural span:
But try this world, with equals be an equal,
Just live this life, with no thought for a sequel.
Andrew Belsey (UK), born in the Fenlands of East Anglia, England, a graduate of Cardiff University, still lives in Cardiff, Wales, where he teaches philosophy at Cardiff University. With Ruth Chadwick, he jointly edited Ethical Issues in Journalism and the Media (Routledge, 1992). He has composed poetry in many genres, both free and formal, for over forty years. His formal verse includes sonnets, some of which he considers as slightly experimental, since he sometimes allows controlled irregularities of rhythm or rhyme. His poetry has appeared in many journals and E-zines, including New Headland, Peer Poetry International, Philosophy Now, Above Ground Testing, Poetry Life and Times, Comrades, Sonnetto Poesia and Snakeskin. He is the author of Anaximander (Outposts Publications, 1974) and A Collection of Four-Line Poems 1962-1999 (Llwynywll Press, © 2000). Andrew’s imagery tends to draw much from concrete and visual elements, examples of which have appeared in various anthologies and magazines, and in Going Round in Circles [and a Square]: Concrete Poems which Might or Might not be Circular Arguments (or Vice Versa) (Llwynywll Press, 2nd ed., © 2002).
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. Selected 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/
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