Sonnet to the Suspension of Reality

by Mary Brunini McArdle

Draw back the curtain from the magic Isle
Whose praises fell from sweet Miranda’s lips;
Our spirits eagerly embrace the dream
Before reality our dreams eclipse.

What is the real and what indeed the dream?
And of them what would be the end itself?
The lacking thereof we in Eden made —
Imagination thus became bereft.

Embrace the infinite the future holds;
These visions which must then be amply fed;
We saturate our minds and hearts with them;
A table for eternal pleasure spread:

The Persian says the world is “but a tent.”
What if the fabric of one side is rent?