Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Teleios, Sandra Edwards

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

This thesis is a collection of poetry that mixes formal and free verse in order to convey the speaker’s spiritual journey in content as well as form. The work introduces a speaker who is deeply religious and who expresses her spirituality in the form of formal poetry such as sonnets as she adheres to certain principles of faith. The use of form in the thesis represents her adherence to those principles, while breaking form is symbolic of her breaking away from those principles. Through the work, the speaker experiences a shift from frustration with the world and its apparent obfuscation …

The Body Seeking Magnificence, Taylor Franson Thiel

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This thesis focuses on how my time as a college athlete, my relationship with my mother, and my experience of an abusive relationship have intersected to impact my personal relationship with my body as I have fluctuated between trying to make it perfect, trying to ruin it, and trying to love it. The collection of poems examines how these forces collided in various ways to change how I thought about myself and my identity. After dealing with the idealized version of what a college athlete should look like and act like, inherited trauma from a mother, and trauma from a …

Desert Body, Lauren Mckinnon

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This thesis is a collection of poems examining certain paradoxes of my body. As a survivor of sexual violence, my body relives trauma which makes it feel uninhabitable. I compare my experiences with the Southern Utah desert. The physical beauty, destruction and inhabitability of the desert teaches me to accept my body as both beautiful and full of grief. The poems move chronologically through my life, beginning with an abusive relationship at the age of sixteen, a move to Moab at nineteen, and becoming a mother at twenty-five. Ultimately, with the desert as my guide, I learn to accept my …

How Poetry Saved Nostradamus From The Pope, Alexis Julander

Fall Student Research Symposium 2022

I came across the work of Nostradamus as part of a curatorial team working with books housed in special collections. Instantly, I was intrigued by the background of the man who's most enduring work is an attempt to calculate the events of the future based off the mathematics of astrology. Nostradamus was a doctor and astrologist living in France from 1503 to 1566. He wrote his first prophesies in 1550 after a visit to Italy sparked his interest in the occult. In order to keep his predictions from seeming to close to biblical prophecies, they were written using poetic forms.

The End Of The Known World, Madeline Thomas

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This thesis forms the foundation for a poetry chapbook infused with Norse mythology and pain. It builds itself on two distinct strands. In the first, I reclaim the story of Hel, goddess of death, and attempt to humanize a figure historically branded as monstrous. Her life forms a narrative line through the collection that attempts to capture the whimsy and horror in myth. Intertwined with the goddess are poems centered around a contemporary speaker who suffers from chronic migraine, an autoimmune disease, unexplained tachycardia, and OCD. The poems in this personal strand vary heavily in both form and content but …

Portrait Of Rich County, Adrian Thomson

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Portrait of Rich County presents the small town of Randolph, Utah in poems describing its wildlife, recreational activities, and the perspectives of citizens in the contemporary rocky mountain west. Special attention to the imagination of the poems’ speaker toward the more dreamlike qualities of Rich County establishes itself throughout, in order to convey a feeling of hope within harsh terrain. This collection examines the theme of salvaging items not often considered, such as rusted junk, ancient houses, or roadside garbage, both in the actions of the speaker and through the act of naming these items upon the page. An over-arching …

A Collection For A Better Misunderstanding, Mark Smeltzer

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

What if being understood becomes even more dreadful than being isolated? This collection of poetry stands between two extremes, using form and language to reflect the struggle of living on a continuum between being understood and being alone. By echoing the direct style of poets like Charles Bukowski and Mark Strand, as well as more abstract figures like May Swenson and Sylvia Plath, this collection asserts that the contradictions we carry can coexist, and even complement one another. Part One features original poetry that relies on the senses to recover old memories. A direct style in Part One seeks to …

May Swenson's Exploration Of Existence And Purpose Through Poetry, Lauren Cunningham

Student Research Symposium

May Swenson explores the idea of belonging, purpose and life by exemplifying that these topics are affected by nature, upbringing, and the environment surrounding an individual, as well as exploring if we experience life or if we are life. Through her writing, Swenson argues that all life is equally valuable, and a being’s purpose is dependent upon belief and circumstance. Presentation Time: Wednesday, 9-10 a.m. Zoom link: https://usu-edu.zoom.us/j/81298203941?pwd=WXZkRjhqdlZNTVlidXk3UnB1K2VtUT09

Sink Hollow Volume 10

Sink Hollow

This year felt like a thunderstorm. Rain pelting down on us so hard it burns. Lightning strikes so stark we have to close our eyes. Thunder rumbling so ominously we feel it deep in our bones. So many things we hold dear have been lost in this storm.

But something we have found is the human ability to feel a raw and powerful pain. We are intrinsically bound to each other, to nature, and to this world by the pain we feel. A pain so powerful and deep you feel it is sucking you under and drowning you.

The pieces …

Sink Hollow Volume 9

Sink Hollow

Our world experiences radical change every day. With this change, things that used to make us feel grounded in our lives may not translate. Our realities may not hold true anymore. Through artistic expression, whatever form that takes, we re-examine what it means to be human after change.

Issue 9 takes a journey of re-examination during times of radical- and sometimes harsh- change. The collage of pieces we have curated re-examine so much of what I thought I knew and give an entirely new meaning to my reality. I would challenge you as you read this issue to re-examine change …

Harvest: Poems, Brittney Allen

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Louise Glück wrote, “the actual making of art is a revenge on circumstance.” The risk, she goes on, is in the possibility of shame. Writing poetry then becomes an act of courage, purchased with sacrifice or loss. “Courage, in this usage, alludes to a capacity for facing down the dark forces.”

In Harvest, a poetry chapbook, the speaker takes revenge on the circumstances of her life by being blunt, bare, and brave on the page. She contends with a male-dominated society and abusive childhood as she moves into adulthood and the supposed saving grace of a marriage. The speaker confesses …

Sink Hollow Volume 8

Sink Hollow

To make a magazine, we seek contrast and even the tension of contradiction.

We hunt for the words that defy experience, and experiences that defy words alone but must be captured by clever poetic contraptions and literary devices that violate the architecture of language and definitions in order to teach us what we can't know by conventional means. We crave the ingenious art of using words to drag meaning outside the semantic containment of words. There's contradiction! This is the skill of infusing words with the power to evoke emotion and connection. The work of the poet, the artist, the …

Sink Hollow Volume 7

Sink Hollow

This issue marks my last as both an undergraduate student and as Sink Hollow's Editor-in-Chief. I have been with this precious publication since I was a freshman, new and green in the creative writing world.

My time with Sink Hollow has been invaluable. It has given me a deep appreciation for the vulnerability of creators and writers alike who share their work with us. It is terrifying to not only bring your creativity into actuality, but to share it publicly for the world to see. I have sat back in awe through every submission period at the bravery of all …

Sink Hollow Volume 6

Sink Hollow

There is no way around it. This issue, our 6th in the last three years, is painful. The underbelly of the human experience is laid bare and there is no hiding from it here.

But that is also what makes it so incredibly beautiful. It is a raw commentary on those things that, despite their pain, make us so uniquely human. It is our ability to trudge on, to continue to seek happiness even when it feels like there may never be joy again that makes us such wonderful, hopeful creatures.

As always, it is my privlege to present the …

Synthetic, Julia L. Prince

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Throughout her life, the poet May Swenson concerned herself with communicating pathways to personal improvement and self-discovery by navigating the distinct social and psychological challenges specific to her historical context, personality, and gender. Though deceased, Swenson is still able to communicate these notions successfully, as many of her poems’ speakers do not conceal their intentions, but rather “force the truth.”

Synthetic, a poetry chapbook, similarly “forces the truth,” as the speaker – like Swenson’s – craves to bare all and discover more about who she is, as she contends with her own social and psychological challenges regarding beauty-gestures, practices, …

Sink Hollow Volume 5

Sink Hollow

During my time with Sink Hollow Literary Magazine, I’ve watched five issues go through the creation process. From the initial submission picks to final design edits, I’ve had the immense pleasure of seeing every volume bloom from nothing into powerful pieces of thought- provoking art. This volume, our fifth one as a team, is no different. The authors and artists we’ve chosen to give a home to, have come together to create a publication that fosters a unique personal awareness. The goal of any good art or writing should be geared toward cultivating a change in the reader or observer. …

A Stiff, Brocaded Gown: Patterns In The Life Of Amy Lowell, Emily Jinju Cottam

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Amy Lowell's poetry serves as a reflection of the challenges and struggles that permeated her life. Her late entry into the world of published poetry at the age of 38 resulted in the presentation of already-solidified beliefs that she had developed since childhood. Although the techniques she employed and the quality of her writing varied in the last decades of her life, Lowell's focus on imagery, rhythm, and mood remained consistent in many of her works. Published in 1916, the poem "Patterns", from Men, Women, and Ghosts, contains themes that are of particular note when placed into the context of …

Sink Hollow Volume 4

Sink Hollow

Sink Hollow is growing up.

Our fledgling magazine is not so fledgling anymore. Bounding into a maturity that even the most passionate founding members could not have envisioned, Sink Hollow is here to stay. It is my pleasure, as this magazine’s third Managing Editor, to present to you my inaugural publication: Sink Hollow Volume IV.

This issue presents a raw, magnifying view into the ever-changing human experience. It reminds us that, no matter where we come from or what has shaped us, we are all uniquely, gloriously human. In these tumultuous times, it is essential that we allow ourselves to …

Sink Hollow 2017 Creative Writing Contest Edition

Sink Hollow

This special edition of Sink Hollow presents the winning entries of the Utah State University Creative Writing Contest, which is open to all USU undergraduate and graduate students from all departments and disciplines. We want to thank all our contestants this year for yet again raising the bar with their excellent work, and for helping to create such a vibrant and inclusive writing community here at USU and in Cache Valley.

Many thanks for the generosity and discriminating taste of our contest judges: Alex Baldwin, Matt DiOrio, Mary Ellen Greenwood, Brian McCuskey, Bonnie Moore, Paige Smitten, and Isaac Timm. Thanks …

Sink Hollow Volume 3

Sink Hollow

It's difficult to believe that my time with this journal has come to a close. It has been one of the greatest experiences of my undergraduate career to be an integral part of its publication.

At the time of this writing, our previous issues have been read over 5,500 times, with this volume set to increase that number substantially. We have worked with undergraduates across the United States and from many other countries as well. A great thanks goes out to all our submitters. Without you there is no journal.

Though I'm moving on to other things, I trust the …

Sink Hollow Volume 2

Sink Hollow

No abstract provided.

Sink Hollow Spring 2016

Sink Hollow

No abstract provided.

Those Who See: Emily Dickinsons And May Swensons Poetic Language Of Spiritual And Scientific Possibility, Samantha Latham

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Emily Dickinson and May Swenson are major American poets who use scientific language in order to explore the productive tension developed when core spiritual beliefs are challenged by new scientific observations and theories. Rather than shrink from the uncertainty resulting from the challenge to faith posed by Darwin in nineteenth-century America, Dickinson and Swenson blend scientific and spiritual language to move beyond the binary opposition often seen as separating these discourses. Dickinson responds most immediately to the advent of Darwinian thought, while Swenson builds on the work of Dickinson as she examines twentieth-century scientific discoveries ranging from the microscopic (the …

Crossing Borders: Cultural And Linguistic Passages In The Poetry Of Pat Mora And Gary Soto, Amber Christine Bowden

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Poets Pat Mora and Gary Soto have long been a presence in anthologies citing their multicultural content, yet their work has not been placed as part of the classroom canon. By leaving their work out of the classroom, we have lost the benefit of their diverse poetry. As the demographics of Utah shift, including works such as Mora and Soto’s becomes more essential for student success. In a close textual analysis of seventeen poems by Mora and Soto we can see that each poet uses a variety of themes to frame their verse. Not only does an overall analysis show …

Innocence Lost: The Tension Of Contrary States In Blake And Milton, Andrew M. Spratt

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Though writing more than one-hundred years apart, the poetic works of John Milton and William Blake interacted with one another to such an extent that they have become increasingly entwined within the critical imagination of scholars over the past two centuries. Despite the recognition of the influence of Milton upon Blake, and subsequent examinations of Blake’s opinions of Milton as an artist, a thorough examination of Blake’s opinion of Milton as the narrator of Paradise Lost has heretofore remained unattempted. This essay examines Blake’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience as a lens through which to interpret the narrator of …

Tomorrow's Living Room, Jason Whitmarsh

Swenson Poetry Award Winners

May Swenson Poetry Award Volume 13, with foreward by Billy Collins. Tomorrow's Living Room offers a pleasantly disorienting verbal territory. The collection is alternately wry and dark, hopeful and bleak, full of unexpected light and laugh-out-loud incongruities. We begin to see that the shape and the furniture of Jason Whitmarsh's world reflect our own world (and may in fact be universal), but we're considering them through completely new terms of engagement.

Mrs. Ramsay's Knee, Utah State University Press

Swenson Poetry Award Winners

May Swenson Poetry Award Volume 12, with foreward by Harold Bloom. Mrs. Ramsay's Knee offers fresh and elegant poems by Idris Anderson, many of them ekphrastic considerations of visual works of art. Among her subjects are paintings by Rembrandt, Rousseau, Pollock, and Chagall, yet she equally explores a set of news photos from the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah.

The Sleepy Hero: Romantic & Spiritual Sleep In The Gawain-Poet, Erin Kathleen Turner Hepner

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

This thesis examines two accepted styles of writing in the Middle Ages, the romance and religious genres, and what purpose they perform in the Gawain-poet’s religious poem, Patience, and his romance poem, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (SGGK). One recently popular line of research among medieval scholars is examining the way medieval authors, such as the Gawain-poet, combine elements of romance and spiritual writings. By funneling the Gawain-poet’s intermingling of the medieval romance and religious genres through the specific lens of sleep, which is represented differently in medieval romance texts than in medieval religious …

Rhyme And Reason In Language Acquisition: Incorporating Poetry Into The Esl Classroom, Kimberly Call Gleason

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Utah is seeing a rapid increase in K-12 students whose native language is not English. With this increase, teachers face the challenge of finding new and effective teaching methods to reach their ESL (English as a Second Language) students. This research explores the study of poetry as an instrument to improve ESL students' pronunciation of English. When read out loud, poetry can be an exercise in pronouncing consonant sounds (from alliteration), decoding vowel sounds (from rhyme), and acquiring the natural speech rhythm of the English language (from meter). Poetry was selected not only because of its exaggerated sound elements (alliteration, …

Yankee, Go Home!: Translations And Poems With Critical Introduction, Devin Jay Hepner

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

This paper attempts to outline the various influences and similarities of my poetry to other poets and poetry of the twentieth-century. The critical introduction will cover those influences and the research I have done on the poets. It also contains individual poems that I feel have a connection with my own poetry and poetic translation. After the critical introduction, I include my poetry in stylistic order followed by Russian translations in chronological order. I will first describe how I came to write and read poetry and its value for me.