Sirens Sing Sweetly: A Petrarchan Sonnet

Sirens sing sweetly down deep in the sea;
a seaman’s plagued plight for fathoms unknown.
Lurking there, creatures chill men to the bone.
Sailors enraptured succumb willingly.
Sea spray, so salty, sings sad harmony
accompany zephyrs–trade winds, they moan.
Davey Jones jeers in his aqueous home
where sad, tortured souls just long to be free.

Galleons glide glistening across placid waves
filled to the brim with fine, fresh human meat.
Adventure, it looms for foolhardy brave;
souls to the slaughter–a swansong, so sweet
soon sends most men to a watery grave–
All is now peaceful, still serenity.

**Notes**
Did you know that one of the most enduring poems in American history is a Petrarchan, or Italian sonnet? In 1903, this poem was engraved on a plaque and placed on the lower level of the Statue of Liberty, where it can still be found today. The poem is titled 'The New Colossus' by Emma Lazarus.
Petrarchan sonnets can alternatively be written in three stanzas with two quatrains, or eight lines and a sestet (six lines) as I have done here in Siren's Sing Sweetly.
Petrarchan sonnets are always 14 lines total, and they are written in iambic pentameter, which features lines of alternating stressed and unstressed syllables.
The rhyme scheme is typically abbaabba cdecde, but that is left up to the poet as long as the poem is in iambic pentameter. I chose an abbaabba rhyme scheme for the octave, and a cdcdca rhyme scheme for the sestet.

Unlike the Shakespearean sonnet there is no rhyming couplet nor is there a votla, or turn, required in the form.
Thanks so much for reading!
~Dean Kuch