It did not seem a lonely life

It did not seem a lonely life
Christopher Bogart

It did not seem a lonely life;
But just a life I’d live alone.

A path that seemed so ordinary,
So all at once ordained,
Seemed laid upon an even plain with
Little broken glass,
Few stones.

The silence of an empty home
In time, just seemed so comforting,
So near that I could clearly hear
The blowing noise of heat and air,
The dropping ice cubes in a white plastic pan,
The regular rotations of the ceiling fan,
The isolated ticking of the clock,
That punctuated passing time.

I rarely stopped to question much
The absence of a warming touch,
A tender hand,
A whisper in the dark.

The wind and rain on stormy nights
Pounded the silence,
Washed away my past regrets,
All traces of missed happiness,
Past pain.

Stark duty always seemed to drive me on
Through days, each born on soft routine,
Hand strung, and drifting on the stream
Passed silent doubt,
Without rhyme nor reason,
I question not what seemed
To be so reasonable.

And, in the end, it did not seem
That it would be such a lonely life.
But just a life I’d live alone.

One rarely thinks of snow.

Sonnet 7
Christopher Bogart

All that you were was all I’d never be
When first we met that warm September night.
I was repressed, and you were so carefree.
‘Twas no surprise our first words were to fight.
‘Twas no surprise when young head butted old
Though barely four Septembers came between
Our births and our young lives yet to unfold:
‘Twas seize the day against what could have been.
Yet somehow we saw past the barricades
And fled our fortresses for open ground.
Our hearts held hope that hope would never fade
As summer turned to fall without a sound.
Our love was new. Our lives had far to go.
On summer nights, one rarely thinks of snow.

"And if I built a fortress around your heart..."

I always loved the lyrics to the song by Sting, "Fortress Around Your Heart." I thought that the words were deceptively simple, yet poetic and profound. He wrote the song as a part of the 1985 album, The Dream of the Blue Turtles. Sting thought it was pretty poetic too because, in an interview after the single was released, he said "Fortress is about appeasement, about trying to bridge the gaps between individuals. The central image is a minefield that you've laid around this other person to try and protect them. Then you realize that you have to walk back through it. I think it's one of the best choruses I've ever written."

The melody to the song is haunting, and reminded me of a time when I had done the same thing to someone I had loved. Later in my life, I wrote a sonnet about it. I will post that sonnet tomorrow. For tonight, I would like to share the lyrics to "Fortress" with you.

Fortress Around Your Heart
Sting

Under the ruins of a walled city
Crumbling towers and beams of yellow light
No flags of truce, no cries of pity
The siege guns had been pounding all through the night
It took a day to build the city
We walked through its streets in the afternoon
As I returned across the field's I'd known
I recognized the walls that I once made
I had to stop in my tracks for fear
Of walking on the mines I'd laid

And if I built this fortress around your heart
Encircled you in trenches and barbed wire
Then let me build a bridge
For I cannot fill the chasm
And let me set the battlements on fire

Then I went off to fight some battle
That I'd invented inside my head
Away so long for years and years
You probably thought or even wished that I was dead
While the armies are all sleeping
Beneath the tattered flag we'd made
I had to stop in my tracks for fear
Of walking on the mines I'd laid

And if I built this fortress around your heart
Encircled you in trenches and barbed wire
Then let me build a bridge
For I cannot fill the chasm
And let me set the battlements on fire

This prison has now become your home
A sentence you seem prepared to pay
It took a day to build the city
We walked through its streets in the afternoon
As I returned across the lands I'd known
I recognized the fields where I'd once played
I had to stop in my tracks for fear
Of walking on the mines I'd laid

And if I built this fortress around your heart
Encircled you in trenches and barbed wire
Then let me build a bridge
For I cannot fill the chasm
And let me set the battlements on fire.

Hope Floats

Sonnet 19
Christopher Bogart

Brisk breezes float him toward a pristine shore
Where true intentions bob beyond the foam.
His hopes too float on swells he’s rode before.
So many times, so many journeys home.
And, in those journeys, what’s been lost and found
Of life that shows increased upon his brow?
He strolls knee deep in issues as profound
As those of sober childhood, long - gone now.
Gone, an adolescence, tanned and strong,
Gone to intellect and tame pursuits.
Through youth deferred come strains of sorrow’s song
As time through crumbling passages still shoots.
Will he hold hopes above his sorrows borne
Until new hope illuminates new morns?

The Saboteur

Sonnet 11
Christopher Bogart

A canopy of leaves obscure the light.
The jungle’s undergrowth shred his fatigue.
The only right he knows now is to fight
A fight that always brings him to his knees.
He trudges through the jungle day by day,
Slashing at the forest with his knife,
To forge a path that leads him on his way
To fight the force that’s threatening his life.
He carries all his weapons. His defense,
The well-worn maps he uses to retreat.
These tactics that have made so little sense
Forever will insure his sound defeat.
When victory appears before his eyes,
The saboteur knows how to blow the prize.

The Tempest

Tempest Dance
Christopher Bogart

Wild winds toss me across fields of high waving grass,
thrash my knees, my ankles, my calves,
slash me with the sharp edges of dark green spears.

Moonlight crafts pale shadows,
lunar landscapes swirl with memory’s ghosts.
Shades skim across blades of green.
The melodious bow sweep of violin strings, to
Play songs to me that were once so sweet,

Now so very violent,
tugging on my sinews,
snatching self-control.

Moods swirl music,
to dance to their tunes, their hysterical tunes,
once so sweet, so very sweet,

Now so very bitter,
They sweep over me
as shadow waves,
the dark murky blue-green of an island ocean,
raking me over smooth stones on the hard pebbled floor.

Under the midnight moon,
my gorge fills with bile,
my head, with visions of angels,
their pale familiar faces wrenched from distant memories,
dancing up against
the windows of my soul, these
diaphanous dolls in wispy white rags,
jigging and jerking,
flailing and fleeing with the sharp tugs of strings
held by some mad puppeteer, when

Suddenly, the wind scoops me up into its gentle hands,
its firm hands, my very life
held in the wells of pliant palms,
their airy fingers twirl me around and around like

A plaything,
a rag doll,
tossed on this tempest of confused and conflicting feeling.


I feel light, and
so very empty.
My life drains in ruby droplets, spattered to the

Frost of cold damp ground,
running down along the spines of high green grasses,
dripping into sticky red puddles,
reflecting the image of an uncaring moon.

Soon, an eerie silence descends
as the icy angels of the frosted night
force their fingers into open wounds,
open tombs,
too late to feel,
to soon to heal the
gashes in my soul.

Green grass becomes my sepulcher.
Brown ground out,
I wait for light to shatter night,
to force the winds to yield at last,
and if by some unerring chance,
to end the torture
of this tempest dance.

Fallen Warrior

Blue Spruce
Christopher Bogart

A fir tree fell in my yard the other day
A strong gust of wind in a nor’easter blew it over.
I only had three trees on the property,
A huge swamp maple in the back
A skinny little brother in the front,
One that has learned not to get his limbs
Entangled in the electrical wires,
And a tall, stately blue spruce
Whose fir and pine cones provided
Decoration for Christmases past.
It was not meant to last.
In the not so distant past
It had been leaning away from the yard
Like it wanted to escape
But, instead, decided to hit the deck,
Well, not actually the deck,
It was kind enough to lay
Down gently on the grass.
It did not disturb the fence,
The gardens, the deck
Or me
By its long, but anticipated, fall.
It went peacefully in its sleep,
Laying down
Without a sound.