In Response, A Sonnet
︎︎︎ C. Sandbatch
︎ June 6, 2026
Watch hunters draw the elephant to die,
in love with some false woman they have made,
a mask of grace, a mistress-shaped facade,
bright, fatal, dressed beneath a painted eye.
If human wit runs subtler, then, than I
can name in any beast that God has made,
who blames me if I fall upon this blade
and die for you, not forced, but willingly?
Some will condemn me; let them. They have known
no sight of you, no angel in the face,
no sovereign form that alters blood and breath;
nor felt how beauty makes its empire shown,
nor passed beneath her wide imperial grace,
nor loved, nor stood so near a living death.
in love with some false woman they have made,
a mask of grace, a mistress-shaped facade,
bright, fatal, dressed beneath a painted eye.
If human wit runs subtler, then, than I
can name in any beast that God has made,
who blames me if I fall upon this blade
and die for you, not forced, but willingly?
Some will condemn me; let them. They have known
no sight of you, no angel in the face,
no sovereign form that alters blood and breath;
nor felt how beauty makes its empire shown,
nor passed beneath her wide imperial grace,
nor loved, nor stood so near a living death.