So the Seward Memorial Library is putting on a poetry contest to help celebrate Nebraska's 150th anniversary. Only original poems about Nebraska or connected to Nebraska are allowed. Now, I'm not a poet - I don't write poems, generally speaking, but I thought I could maybe give it a shot. So, because I'm not Shakespeare, I decided to go with a sonnet. Well, a sonnet-ish poem, anyway. Here's what I came up with.
There's a song by C.W. McCall called
Aurora Borealis. In it, he tells
Of a city boy who had never seen the stars
Or the Milky Way. I wonder if the swells
and swirls of the prairie eluded him also,
if he'd ever seen the wheat, golden in the sun,
or felt the fierce terror of a tornado
or watched the light vanish below the horizon.
I'm guessing not.
I'm fortunate, I guess.
I've watched the sun fade out and the stars fade in.
But it took a southern semester before, I confess,
their splendor rose again above the din
Of busy life and no chance there to see.
They give perspective, out here on the prairie.
As I said, I'm not a poet. So my question is, should I enter it in the library contest? Should I forget I ever put pencil to paper and created this? Should I never, ever, ever again attempt or even pretend to attempt poetry?
