In Difficulties

I wrote a curtal sonnet but it stank.

I needed all of 14 lines to say

the whole of what I had in mind; present

a thesis that would float before it sank –

in fact not sink at all but stretch and play,

its movements elegant and confident.

Instead, alas, it doesn’t wave but drown.

Without room to manoeuvre, there’s no way

to save it – what I meant as eloquent

is chopped abruptly, three lines short, shut down
unspent.

Written for a form challenge at Poetic Asides