A Song of Sonnets

Every year before reading Romeo and Juliet with my eighth graders, the sonnet comes alive, becomes a modern, living, community experience. We study its history and structure, paying specific attention to Shakespearean sonnets as a way to transition into the play. Students also write their own sonnets, and at the end of the unit, we have a Sonnet Slam. This celebration always renews my appreciation of the form. Though some students resist it, most find guidance in its rules, enjoy the mathematical qualities, and free their romantic and sentimental sides, especially the tough guys who often end up writing the most tender poems and getting the most “Awwwwwwws” during the Slam.

When I first had to write a sonnet in graduate school, I detested it, thinking it kept my creativity on a leash. I yawned and rolled my eyes when I had to read Milton, Donne, and Shelley. I wanted to beat my head against my desk as I measured the syllables and beats. Writing a sonnet was even more frustrating; it felt as if I were just trying to fill in blanks with random words that pounded in my ears with a monotonous two-step beat and did not resonate with meaning or linguistic ingenuity.

Over time, I began to read a wider range of sonnet styles and could see beyond its rigid foundations. I realized that many poems by Gerard Manley Hopkins, who I fell in love with in college after my professor Donna Masini recited his poems to the class, were sonnets; I was able to understand how his unique structure contributed to the emotional intensity. I read Claude McKay’s “America” and “The White House” and found the strict iambic pentameter soothing combined with the difficult racial issues explored. Reading Billy Collins’ “American Sonnet” and “Sonnet” helped me retain a sense of humor about the form.

The more sonnets I read and write, the more mystery, surprise, difficulty, frustration, and delight I find hidden in their syllables, stresses, and syntax. Here are three I wrote, all inspired by motherhood. The first poem, "Motherless Christmas", recalls a Christmas when my mother was in the Philippines while the rest of my immediate family (father, brother, and husband) ate at a Cuban-Chinese restaurant in Corona, Queens - how we pined for her homemade dishes! The next poem, "Abstaining", was written when I was pregnant with my first child, and it's about something I couldn't have at the time but really wanted. The last poem, "Sonnet to Silence", comes shortly after my daughter was born; it is also about something I pined and longed for: quiet.

Looking back, I never thought my words would feel at home in the body of a sonnet. But after revisiting it over and over again, my words have found its rhythmic pulse soothing yet monotonous. They have found its walls freeing and comforting. And its limited space, three quatrains and a couplet, leave just enough room to venture without too much trepidation, still allowing words to wander and fill the spaces.


Motherless Christmas

On Christmas with my mother in ‘Pinas
the lights are dim, the kitchen is empty,
and no grain of rice, noodle, or lumpia
to taste. In the fridge, moldy adobo
in plastic quarts, tomatoes festering,
piles of pigs’ feet, bacon, hard loaf of bread.
It’s just a treeless, wreathless, giftless day.
Empty, carpeted space is our shrine.
Nativity scene hidden in garage
while evergreens whip against shutters, bring
wind in. Instead we abandon the house,
eat out: asados, maduros, rice, beans
make us quietly crave her steaming plates
that warm us like round, fresh lumpia wrappers.



Abstaining

If only I could drink once in a while,
have some orange bubbly mimosas with brunch,
set my sunny, spirited afternoon buzz.
Why can’t I have some Belgian ales, when my
husband drinks them with dinner every night.
I watch him slowly pour into frosted mug
and bring to his lips the golden ambrosia
while I, like a recent ascetic, pine
for the forbidden. I cannot endure
this abstinence alone. I will say: Please,
don’t drink beer or wine at home. Stay sober
with me. Have some sympathy pregnancy.
It’s just two more months of being austere.
When baby comes, we’ll have Chimay and cheer.



Sonnet to Silence

Every day I lose you to Jacinta’s
tambourine and bongo-playing monkey.
When she sleeps, the traffic of dishes,
pureeing rice, Ameda pump prevent
your entrance. Even in the mornings, you
are stolen by grunts and knees on my chest.
In bed at night, on park paths, my brain’s
a shaking tambourine of if only
my baby slept past six and wasn’t glued
to the boob, if belly flab disappeared,
If only I could sit and meditate
without the sound of blocks banging on ground.
Instead as keyboard ticks and door slams shut
I find you on my dusty, lamp lit desk.




References/Further Reading:
Hacker, Marilyn. “The Sonnet”. An Exaltation of Forms ed. by Annie Finch and Kathrine Varnes.

Links to Sonnets:
Gerard Manley Hopkins: “Carrion Comfort”: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=173657;
“God’s Grandeur”: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=173660
Claude McKay: “America”: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20221;
“The White House”: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15248
Billy Collins: “Sonnet”: http://www.billy-collins.com/2005/06/sonnet_billy_co.html
“American Sonnet”: http://poetry365.tumblr.com/post/62623649/american-sonnet-billy-collins