For the last fifteen weeks, we have worked on a sonnet — publicly, collaboratively, courtesy of the "Next Line, Please" feature on The American Scholar website. Here is the winning sonnet. We wrote he poem line-by-line and had a lot of intellectual fun doing so. If you click here, you will get an explanation of the title and the rules of the game as it evolved.
Jailbreak
Our dreams as disparate as our days uniform,
We crave a lovely scandal with someone well-known;
Midnight champagne, penthouse lit by thunderstorm,
In this version of darkness, we are never alone.
If marriage is a cage, we can force the lock, but he
Clutches the key, a jailer too stubborn to learn
To read the graffiti. If need be, he can turn
A bouquet to a wreath. Then we will be
Two mourners arguing terms of interment. We must
Appease our lust, our momentary bliss subject to
The rules of engagement. The conflicts of lust. Just
Look at the way they look at us. As though we're too
Precipitous with a plot, as if we can
Dig up the words to write the wrongs of man.
The poem's authors are Michael C. Rush, Angela Ball, Elizabeth Solsburg, Christine Rhein, Patricia Smith, Paul Michelson, "Poem Today," Berwyn Moore, Joe Lawlor, Brandon Crist, Charise Hoge, David Lehman, and Millicent Caliban. A pseudonym — and who knows, maybe even a heteronym — is in the works.