Sonnet IV - Jetlag

Sometimes the best way to work with structural rules of poetry is to break them. One of my favorite simple examples of this is Keats' sonnet "On Sitting Down to Read King Lear Once Again." Keats writes a traditional sonnet, albeit with a slightly tweaked rhyme scheme, but on the final line - "Give me new phoenix wings to fly at my desire" - he switches from pentameter to hexameter (in other words, he adds an extra metric foot). The way that Keats broke structure here to underscore the feeling of the final line fascinated me so much that I wrote an entire paper on it... although I don't think my grade was that outstanding, so I could be the only one who feels that way.

In any case, I was inspired during a particularly difficult commercial airline experience to try my own play on structure. While squeezed into the last row of a 747 full of loud people and louder children, unable to sleep and contemplating infanticide, I messed around with a Petrarchan sonnet (I don't even know why, maybe I wanted to embrace the suffering) in iambic tetrameter instead of pentameter. So see if the shorter lines make you feel as crushed an uncomfortable as I was when I wrote them. Also note the alteration of the final line, which I ripped off from Keats. Thanks, John!

Note: Since this is a Petrarchan sonnet, there is some unnecessary angst and sentimentality. It's like a rule.

Sonnet IV: Flight

Inside the screaming metal beast,
The bird that swallows humans whole,
Presses the body and the soul
With each regurgitated feast—
My skin is sore, my bones are creased
And cracked, and travel takes a toll
On bodies broken of control—
To sleep—it’s been a year at least.

My head rolls deathlike on my shoulder;
I’ll find a better way to fly
Or failing that, to fall instead
And as the cycled air turns colder
You’ll be with me against the sky,
Your shoulder soft and warm under my head.