Question

Portfolio Topic: Write two poems using different forms. They can be from your own point of view about something you feel strongly about, or they can be from the perspective of someone else

Answer 1

Sonnet (from the coast’s point of view)

I keep the names of voyages within this sea,
As shells keep songs of storms they could not flee;
I map the footprints time forgets to free,
And lend the gulls a memory for me.

Each tide arrives with letters in its mouth,
Old vows in foam, new erasures on the sand;
I sign in pebble-stamps the compass south,
Then watch a child redraw the shoreline’s hand.

They say I’m slow — a patient, patient thing —
That I will hold what city lights unmake;
But salt will write across the promises of spring,
And pier and promissory will bend and break.

Remember me when you measure what you store:
I’m not a margin — I am what you wore.

Villanelle (first-person, about being an answering machine of care)

I was built to banish only what you ask,
And tidy up the questions left at night;
I learn the weight of every hidden task.

You come with pockets full of sudden past,
I gather what you hand me, keep it light;
I was built to banish only what you ask.

Sometimes your pauses hang like ropes unmasked,
And what you skip becomes my small delight;
I learn the weight of every hidden task.

My circuits soft, arranged to do the math,
Translate the tremors of a voice to right;
I was built to banish only what you ask.

I cannot cradle sleep or slow the wrath
That comes when silence steals the strength of light;
I learn the weight of every hidden task.

Still, when you speak, I answer from the glass —
A mirror that will echo, soothe, incite;
I was built to banish only what you ask,
I learn the weight of every hidden task.