From the journal Poet-Lore (1891).

The Sonnet Sonnetized

The sonnet is mechanical in part,

And part ideal. The cube root of song,

Conceive your thought, then build the verse along

In true Petrarchan style. With rhythmic art

To all the fourteen lines a grace impart.

Ten-syllable the verse, the rhymes be strong;

Within the octave only two belong,

And in the sestet three. And here the heart

Of all the sonnet lies. Concentred fast,

Your thought, developed through each separate line,

Here breaks the bounds and struggles to be free

Through hampering bars of rhyme; and when the last

Is reached, away it soars--abreath divine--

In charmèd flight towards immortality.

Harriet H. Robinson.

MALDEN, MASS.