Goal!
I wrote my love along a napkin on
A restaurant table. Others watched a match
On artificial turf. They watched brawn,
And I wrote poetry, though just a smatch
Of it, a sonnet meant to be about
That thing men worship when they’re not
Involved with power and do not have a snout
In money’s trough, and when their souls aren’t fraught
With death and all that stuff. I wrote of you
(Of you and me) and thought of scoring, sweat,
Affection, passion—even God. Thus through
My joy I never even thought, “Regret.”
A napkin feels the stain of semen, part
Desire, part Christ—the share that makes your heart.
Very interesting poem hitting on key themes which come up throughout these sonnets so far, interestingly intersecting here: poetry itself; love; God/religion. I don’t know if the irregularity of line 3 is a slight flaw or really a bonus feature, providing some variety, but it is missing a beat, there after the caesura, as if the caesura is itself, perhaps, that missing beat, with 3 stressed beats after it, I don’t know. But, PERHAPS, to regularize, something like:
On artificial turf. {As/While} they watched brawn,
I sat and wrote poetry—just a smatch
the word “poetry” still disrupts the meter, but . . . less so this way?