What ring may best a marriage?

To walk the streets of gold through pearly gates,
Jerusalem descending from the clouds,
To sing, forever loosed from earthly weights,
And enter heaven, chanting holy rounds,
To see our fellows passed beyond the grave,
Discourse with saints and poets and the like,
To wink at ancient heroes, ever brave,
And meet that blessed land, where is no night-
T’would last a second if He weren’t there,
And glory would be lost for Heaven’s King-
We soon forget the focus of our care,
As wives forget the husband, love the ring.
Our hope is paved not with the streets of gold,
Our glory and our treasure is our God.
-Tyler William O’Neil
-July 19, 2009

Identity

As flows a river so does rush the sun,
Ancestral honors dribble to their doom,
The present ecstasy wells forth, undone,
And future generations flood the tomb.
Mankind was fluid, is and is to be,
The self of yesteryear became a daze,
Each moment, for a second, he is free,
Tomorrow and eternally, a haze!
Yet certainty illuminates the mind,
The visage of the lion and the lamb,
Though all that is about him may unwind,
He still can say the sacred word, “I am.”
Though one may never touch a river twice,
Existence cannot be a game of dice.
Tyler William O’Neil
March 27, 2009

A Tribute To Disgrace

In order to secure all freedom’s boons,
Establish justice and give her a voice,
We must not overlook each woman’s wounds,
But give to her the liberty of choice.
Yet equal are we born, and equal die,
And freedom must extend to every soul,
We cannot suffer any genocide,
Regardless of the target or the goal.
Yet even if no murder is implied,
And fetuses are just a bunch of cells,
Abortion should disgrace all women’s pride,
For they who kill their children kill themselves.
So even if it finds morality,
Abortion cannot square with dignity.
-Tyler William O’Neil
June 2, 2009

Terra Nostra

The tyrant ousted, liberty restored,
A senate and a legal code assumed,
A nation strong in virtue, soon the lord
Of mare nostrum, sea by land consumed.
Yet liberty fits not the world entire,
A few self-governed men can rule a state,
Expansion soon makes liberty expire,
Debauchery and Caesar are its fate.
Augustus worked to fix the malady,
Surrendering his station as the king,
Yet Rome was irredeemable indeed,
And Caesars ruled ‘til Oadacer’s sting.
Perhaps the land by two seas flanked is wise,
To leave its conquests free to rule their lives.
-Tyler William O’Neil
May 8, 2009

XIX Mater aut Era?

(Mother or Mistress)
The breath of power on the silent air-
She whispers with the wind and shrouds the night.
With mighty mist she flits a form so fair,
Betraying bounteous beauty to my sight!
My passion flares to see a lovely lass,
My spirit spirals speedily to her,
Yet this empiric maiden minces class,
Invented pulchritude, mechanic myrrh.
From age to age, men follow Her allure,
With Reason they seduce Her steady grace,
A masked affair, which ever will endure,
Until they look their master in the face!
Yet if, in heady haste, he waits to pray,
This silent secret sin shall pass away.
-Vir Cogitans Americanus
Scribit Dies XXI Octobribus, Anno Domini MMVII

XVI Prima Proposita Mea

(My First Purposes)
I wish to cure the ills that are our own,
The ever-hidden evils of our time,
They are injustice, which is never shown,
And emptiness, whose remedy is rhyme.
Leviathan, to seize through every means
The hard-earned funds which keep all men alive!
You do deserve some praise, or so it seems,
But not control to rule our very lives!
The void, our even more disastrous foe,
You steal from all the purpose of their lives!
If life is to be happy and gain dough,
Its nature is too shallow to survive!
Much poetry and law I wish to write
To call the sun, and end this evil night!
-Vir Cogitans Americanus
Scribit Dies XI Octobribus, Anno Domini MMVII

XV Amor Prudentitatis Secundus

(The Second Love of Wisdom, the second sonnet on Philosophy)
As Plato said, one ought to question all,
Each answer will lead closer to the Truth,
Philosophy does ever to me call,
For he who knows is better fit to choose.
This modern life is ever full of choice,
And one ought not to choose 'til he is sure,
Yet if you wait too long, you'll have no voice,
And silence cannot be a useful cure.
The Earth is ere beset by many flaws-
Injustices and evil spring to mind,
And what will better shut their hungry jaws,
That Truth's amazing power to unwind?
False thoughts, when brought to light, lose their appeal,
Yet Truth must first be found to make it real.
-Vir Cogitans Americanus
Scribit Dies XI Octobris, Anno Domini MMVII

XIV Cupiditas Puerilis

(Boyish Passion)
A thousand does there are, a thousand maids,
And yet there are a hundred fit for me,
I set my sights on one, of sight and age,
That pleases all my fancy and dismay.
For as I do advance, she flees away-
Or as I choose to act, another has-
Must always my desire be at bay,
When all my hope and misery are hers?
With anguish'd heart, I draw myself away,
With bleeding soul, I dare accept the truth-
I choose again, another comely maid,
To find her gone from me, oh horrid youth!
I either long for treasure far too vast,
Or for despair and sorrow to the last!
-Vir Cogitans Americanus
Scribit Dies XVII Septembris, Anno Domini MMVII

XIII Metamorphoses

(Changes of Form)
Apes goggle from their cyan sandy cage,
They stare at finest specimens of Man,
Their greatest soldier, and their wisest sage,
Are naught but ash to those whose legs can stand!
Those noble ones are Nature's best design,
Selected not by Her but by themselves,
Their willed success, against the foes of time,
Evolves them from the bestial to themselves!
To cross the desert sand they boarded ships,
To till the Promised Land, they used their will,
They dipped and dodged despair from death's own lips,
To match the woes of Nature with their skill!
No clan of apes can match these Israelites;
They fear defear while suns alight their nights!
-Vir Cogitans Americanus
Scribit Dies XIII Septembris, Anno Domini MMVII

XII Vita Bona

(The Good Life)
The man of virtue is the only Man,
The law of virtue is the only Law,
The only ever fully happy land
Is in the self of Him without a flaw!
Remorse for ev'ry sin is part of life,
The cry of torment, parcel of the soul-
If only one could end the horrid strife
Between his action and his Perfect Goal!
Is sorrow not the opposite of joy?
Is evil not the opposite of good?
Is life a boon, if one must self-destroy,
Because one never does what'ere he should?
Is he who stumbles verily alive,
If he has not a purpose to survive?
-Vir Cogitans Americanus
Scribit Dies IV Septembris, Anno Domini MMVII