Student Sonnets
Poetry Selected From Dr. Francis's Creative Writing Class
Hayley Fleener ’24
Originally published in The English Aggie April 2022 issue
The Moon
Audrey Hendrick
To hold you tight
And let you poison my skin
Your rays fill my night
Preventing the darkness from being my ruin
But oh how that is a lie
My nightlight, only a reflection of you
You are deceiving my eye
You knew.
I study you, loving you from a far
If I were too close, you will be my demise
Because I am still earth and you a star
So I watch in awe as you fill my skies
But without you, I will join the darkness
And the void in me would be endless.
In Defense of Apathy
Tyler Gonzalez
My heart is mercurial, fickle, and small.
I have a depth, both endless and shallow.
My chest contains the cosmos, skin a shawl;
Gaunt from the stars in my eyes, face sallow.
Though the universe implodes within me,
Stuck am I on the labors of true love.
For I’m not my own, instead a scream
From a borrowed mouth, tie grants from ‘bove.
Is there the capacity within me
To let another crack my chest open,
And stare at the dying stars? Would they see?
And so my ribs remain shapely, shut-in.
A chest, again hollow and chipped, yearns so
For another body, for us to burn.
Flaming Sonnet, Draconian Love
River Scott
My tears implore you to relent your love,
But your embrace of soothing fire devours,
The bluebirds tweet, the dragons coo as doves,
Deception I condemn, lament for ours.
Our love, unable to reduce to ash,
For it has always been ablaze, my dear.
Forbidden to succumb to lover’s clash,
Eternal flames assuage and fade my tears.
Its singeing scorch of passion and of threat,
Exudes a warmth, as cold regret lambasts.
My hands-your claws-do melt in flames, and yet,
Our gilded rings remain intact, held fast.
Shall love as mighty as ours conquer all?
For it has vanquished me, your faithful thrall.
A Hot Summer Day
Mia Helpert
That hot summer day, you were drinking tea,
walking with a vase for mother’s flowers.
On the fountain’s edge, its water showers.
The vase breaks, but whose fault? We disagree.
I write to you, for it will set me free,
but for the two of us, limited hours.
Soon I’m forced away, stuck in a tower.
Holding my hand, you said come back to me.
After war, I don’t stop searching for you.
But now you’re drowning, praying you don’t die,
while I’m asleep, and I won’t see daylight.
We long for the sea, a dream we both knew.
It’s time to give up, and look up at sky,
knowing that one day we will reunite