Sometimes I Must Avert my Gaze [sonnet]
In some strange way it hurts to see your face.
It’s not a thrusting, piercing spike of pain
but rather like some shadowed chlorophane
where splendour morphs with melancholy’s grace.
Perhaps your visage bleeds with ancient throes
which rippled through your lifeline when it rained;
just as a swollen river overflows
when all its shorelines cannot be contained.
But even though I must avert my gaze
sometimes (for your affliction is my own);
such empathy my love for you displays
for in my heart your beauty I enthrone.
So if I ever quickly look away
please know it does not happen with dismay.
© 2012, Alan Morrison
The Naked Troubadour 