(Student Submission)
Theme: Community in Isolation
Artist Statement:
I wrote a Villanelle at the beginning of this long quarantine that highlights how I felt my hometown in Southern California was being affected. Compared to how life normally was it was a ghost town, with medical, food, and government workers literally risking their lives to provide comforts for us. Seeing all of this take place really opened my eyes to how communities could work together and achieve so much, while also staying safe at a distance with little physical interaction, and how with the right effort and enough time we can achieve anything we put our hearts to, no matter the difficulty.
I hoped this villanelle would help provide perspective to people from different places about how the world is working in places that they cannot see every day, as I have been curious about how other communities are dealing with this stressful time.
The Skies of Gold
The sun will shine again in the skies of gold
The world may have halted, but will spin again
Thanks to the hearts of the bold.
Spending Hours…Days… Weeks
As if to put a bandage around the world
The sun will shine again in the skies of gold.
From the hills to the mountains
I can see and hear the joys of life
Thanks to the hearts of the bold.
People risking everything like a medic in the fields of combat
Often unappreciated and forgotten
The sun will shine again in the skies of gold.
The tide comes and goes as a living being, breathing breaths of life
The World has held its breath for so long, but has taken its next breath
Thanks to the hearts of the bold.
Life will blow through the towns and cities like a calm breeze
The streets will bustle again, parks will sing songs of glee
The sun will shine again in the skies of gold
Thanks to the hearts of the bold.