Sonnets from Carine Senior High School Students

Recently I visited Carine Senior High School for National Poetry Week where a couple of classes were looking at the Sonnet form. We looked at Sonnets from Shakespeare to Tranter, taking them on a whirlwind journey from the revolutionary forms created by the Bard through to John Tranter's hundred sonnets in his earlier collection, Crying In Early Infancy.

Their teacher, Helen McCormick, kindly sent me a couple of sonnets by two of the students, so - with their permission - I will share them with you now.

Sonnet #4,359
by KALE CROSBIE

Shall I compare thee to a bowl of cereal?
Thou art more lovely - though contain less whole grains.
While a bowl of cereal is a tasty morning snack
and contains many nutrients essential to well being,
I believe you could far outpace one in a triathlon,
Or maintain a better golfing handicap.
Cereals wither by milk's souring course untrimmed,
But thy eternal dairy shall not rot!
I would also like to point out that such a bowl
Does not have the mental capacity to operate simple devices
Such as an umbrella, doorknob or wooden box,
Whereas you exceed at such activities.
So long as brunch can provide us with these nutrients,
So long lives my preference for you over Uncle Toby.


*

The Model of Modern Society
by Hannah Richards

Her hair is ruler straight with multi-hued tips,
eyelashes flick dark black while lines are drawn.
A tan visage, cherry-licking lips.
Glass reflects a sleek, short silk, slimly worn.

A diamond bag worth half the week's earnings
clutched at her side, the nails creamy French fakes.
The men sigh, brought back to common yearnings,
women cry, oh how that jealousy aches.

Replications stuck in people’s faces.
At new birth, will she be remembered?
Girls; dreaming of re-walking her paces.
Sly reporters; her story dismembered.

To be famous, to be rich, to be hot;
aspirations are founded on these, are they not?

*

Thank you also to Betty Bryant who organised the visit, and to Robin (spl?) Archer, teacher, and the great librarians I met who were nothing like the ones I see causing such havoc on ABC TV.


PS: I apologise to Kale who I had as Kate for about two days - sorry about that.