Petrarchan Sonnet

Something interesting I found from two years ago.


I had to write a Petrarchan (Italian) sonnet about the Hero Quest, covering especially the resisting of the call to action, the eventual acceptance and departure, the acknowledgement of difficulties the quest-taker will face, the journey inside one's soul to understand oneself, the discovery of a supreme being, and the facing and acceptance of death. 


An Italian sonnet is in fourteen lines, iambic pentameter, with a strict rhyme scheme. Rereading it now, I don't like it as much as I did when I finished writing it and got my grade back. Ah, well. I am overly critical of my own writing.


Dust to Dust


O woe! I hear the call, I can't resist.
This quest, I do not want, but I must go.
O woe! My country cries for me to show
My strength, my will to fight with sword and fist.

Alas, the time has come, I must persist.
I shall depart to sounds of capon's crow
Like Job, through trials and tricks my faith must grow.
Great heroes called must brave the storms and mist.

But Hark! My Hope! My Head! My Heart does swell!
God’s love to learn and so to not live blind
Progressing on this epic I've been thrust
A journey up though Heaven, down through Hell
A quest deep into Soul, to Heart, to Mind
In death, like Yorick, ending dust to dust.

I am not an actress

For my Shakespeare class this semester, I have to perform in a group of five a thirty minute performance of some Shakespeare play. We chose Twelfth Night. Ugh. Don't get me wrong -- Twelfth Night is my favorite Shakespeare play. I absolutely love it. However.... I am not an actress. And I'm playing Viola, aka THE LEAD ROLE. She has the second most lines in the play, following a character who we're not even including in our production. Great. Cue bad flashbacks to tenth grade, where I had to perform a soliloquy from any work we had read thus far. I chose to perform something from, you guessed it, Twelfth Night. There's a scene in the play where a couple characters play a practical joke on a servant, Malvolio, who is madly in love with his mistress, Olivia, in which they write him a letter "from her" telling Malvolio how Olivia wants him to act and dress around her. It's a hilarious scene, and I could have had a blast with it.... if I didn't screw it up. I walked up in front of the class, started reciting it, aaand promptly forgot my words in the middle of everything. But did I just go on? Noooope. I stood there, mouth agape, probably looking a lot like Billy the Largemouth Bass or whatever that freaky singing fish was called, hemming and hawing a lot, trying to recover my lines.

Jove knows I love; But who? Lips do... uhhhh.... uhhmmmmmm... 

Yeah. It was bad. Really bad. I completely blanked in front of everyone, jeopardizing my grade and looking like an idiot in front of my crush (who later turned out to be the worst boyfriend I ever had... too bad he didn't get turned off by my floundering).

This brings us full-circle back to now, where I am playing the lead role of Twelfth Night opposite a guy who, you guessed it, I'm all hot for. Fabulous. Not only do I have to memorize lines, but I have to get over my whole stupid nervousness thing I get around guys I am attracted to. Thankfully we have a whole semester to get comfortable with each other before we have to perform, and I am feeling more confident and comfortable around him (probably because, even though he is still hot, he's, well, kind of an idiot. I dated a stupid guy once. I won't do that again.), but it's really one more stress I do not need. We chose our scenes today and we are dividing up the lines over the weekend and starting rehearsals on Wednesday. And, because of this, I am home eating Nutella. From the jar. With a spoon. Don't judge, I need the PEA love chemical because I am stressin hardcore.

I figured I would edit and add this in, because it is ridiculous. I have eaten like a quarter of the Nutella jar. I need help.

It just tastes too good.

That's it, I am putting it back in the kitchen. Ridiculous.

First!

Yeah, yeah, creative title, I know. Titles have always been the bane of my existence. I always hated when my teachers would force me to write titles on my essays, especially on in-class essays, where I'm frantically writing my essay in the limited time we were alloted, and I would always leave the title for last, riiight before I turned it in, where I would then write in huge, practically illegible script some terrible title that barely pertained to my essay. I figured when I got into college, I wouldn't be forced to write titles on my papers, but no, I have been forced to write more titles on my papers than I can count.

Well, that's certainly an interesting introduction, ain't it? Let's start over.

Hmm, about me, eh? I am an English major, a second-semester junior in college at this present time, I go to a liberal arts public university in SoCal that is expensive, but at least it's cheaper than a private school, right? I have lots of pets that I love very much, and I am an animal-lover in general, except for spiders. Spiders can go die (except not really, because they're essential to the environment and all that. But all the spiders in my HOUSE can go die). I was raised by a single mother in squalor. We live in a house now, but it's not exactly nice or in the best neighborhood, but at least there's no occasional gunshots in the distance. I love literature a whole lot, and I hope to spend the rest of my life teaching high schoolers to love reading as much as I do. I'm an English tutor at a local community college, and it doesn't pay nearly well enough (something that won't change when I'm a teacher, unfortunately). I like food, and I'm usually eating or wanting to eat. I have been known to burst out into spontaneous solo dance parties, even if there's not music playing, but there's usually music playing so I don't look completely insane. I also sing. Loudly and badly. But I do it anyway. I like music, romantic candle-lit dinners, long walks on the beach... er, wait, this is turning into dating-profile status. I think it's because I'm hungry (see above). So welcome to my head. It's random and sometimes amusing, and I hope you enjoy your stay.

Time for my second breakfast.