ah, there is is

Something odd happened just now when I posted up the sonnet I got this morning on Facebook. I'm usually fanatical about typos, but for some reason while I was transcribing it out of my notebook I made the same typo, twice. Which altered the meaning of the lines slightly without detracting from them: "there it is" became "there is is," not once but twice. Emphatically. So I think I'm going to make that accidental change permanent. And come to think of it, do it one better and change "all of it is true" to "all of is is true" in the third line from the end!

To all that passes through my hands which is in any sense alive, I wish to allow, to the extent I can, the same freedom I myself relish. And ultimately even a poem only passes through my hands and out into the world, whose citizen I am and which I love with a towering passion.


Ah, there is is, the universe again
Just when I had it narrowed to a point
Tight-gripped in thumb and finger like a pen
Round, nestled down the first and second joint
There is is now, the world again made fresh
I roll out wet upon it with a slap
To see the dreams of all I love made flesh
And hot coals heaped in our Opponent's lap
No mortal soul can match the Maker's art
What lives is dense with riches, through and through
I would be straining at the leash to start
But I am free, and all of is is true
Flung wide, all me gives thanks to Him in whom
The living live - I roar - "Make room - Make room!"