"In the pause" [news sonnet ars poetica]

I think I shall write on the news   solely in sonnets
or maybe a stray villanelle   on rare occasion
it's wonderful not to be worried about the omission
of crucial details   a'buzz in the newsies' bonnets

and equally fine   to elide the sharpened opinions
that arise willy-nilly   whenever the world finds grief
a sonnet can loll   in the pause preceding belief
and is free to muse   or to quiz the dutiful minions

who array themselves   to defend the realm of facts
essaying   with bracing zeal   to get things right
extracting the meaning   inherent in wayward acts

although never addressing   the argument of night
whose cluster of stars   ambiguously impacts
the theme of general dark   with points of light



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[Jotted yesterday around cover margins of the New York Review of Books while walking south on Connecticut Avenue NW]

This can be counted as no. 3 in a sequence of News Sonnets -- antecedent poems in the sequence being:

no. 1:   Arnold Speaks
no. 2:   "Soon to give birth"