With apologies for the meter, rhyme, and scansion.

The Sunday Sonnet deadline's drawing near,

And yet I cannot find a thing to post.

The sonnet is a form that I hold dear,

The subjects, though, are what I hate the most.

From Petrarch down on through Louis MacNeice

They deal with death and loss and sorrow, too.

I'd like to read a cheery one, at least,

Or something silly. Is that hard to do?

Sing me a song of puppies! Sing of shoes!

Write lines about the bathroom being clean!

For God's sake, you have nothing there to lose

If, for once, you're cheerful. Don't be mean.

But not one sonnet will throw me a bone,

And so I sigh, and shrug, and write my own.