Poetry Week by Week: Free Verse: Guest poet Samantha Gomez

Poetry Week by Week continues with a guest post by my other daughter, Samantha (my daughter Julia was a guest during week one). Samantha loves to express herself through poetry, and she's quite good at it. Sometimes I think that's funny because she got started at this poetry thing rather reluctantly. I've no doubt she'll go far if she keeps it up!

And now, here is Samantha!

A couple Fridays ago, my university’s jazz choir and I had the privilege of seeing the Real Group, a world-renowned (semi-Swedish) vocal jazz group, live in concert. It was truly one of the most awe-inspiring musical experiences of my life.

The piece that struck me most was their modern rendition of a Latvian folk song. They sang the tune in its original language, but one didn’t have to be fluent in Latvian for the performance to be incredibly impactful. 

Afterward I wrote the following poem in an attempt to capture my impression of the piece’s story.

Dziesma (song)

The pale morning stirs sleepily
hushed
under a swath of iridescent clouds,
grass still clinging
to pre-dawn memory.
The sun filters through
a crack
in the sky’s tree-crowned mould,
while below,
a man releases his one, spirited horse
to let it run
free, unspoiled,
among the wildflowers,
to see its coat catch distant light
like the unencumbered sea.

On the hilltop,
against the sky,
mist, hanging low,
betrays vision, muffles untamed hoofbeats—
but the man knows his spirited horse,
who returns home
at the sound of its master’s lonely voice.

About the poet: 

Samantha Gomez is an almost-sophomore in college. Her ideal life would be to nerd out about things she loves and get paid for it, so she decided to pursue that dream and become a teacher of history. She hails from somewhere in the picturesque Midwest and answers to the following titles: Mezzo-Soprano, Teller of Tales, Shield-Maiden of Rohan, and Mantis.

If you would like to read more of Samantha's poetry and other ramblings, visit her blog.