You're Like a Slice of Pizza

I like having students write sonnets when we study Shakespeare and I hope they are as happy with the results as I usually am. My AP classes read Macbeth and part of completing the unit is writing a sonnet that is somehow influenced by the play. As with the Poe summer assignments, I am also attempting the sonnet. I chose the theme of opposites/reversals that figures heavily in the play, not to mention a little inspiration from Shakespeare's Sonnet 130 ("My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun"), and almost wrote a love sonnet. Hope you enjoy…

You're Like a Slice of Pizza

You're like a slice of pizza with a hair

on it—not quite what I asked for, but good

enough for now. You're soft and warm and prayer's

not likely to fix you or my tainted food.

But you're more permanent than any prayer

that's ever passed my lips. I still don't have

my wishes—pimped-out rides and cribs, or the flair

of Johnny Depp. No one asks for my autograph

and I didn't ask for you—yet here you are.

It's like the time I went to get some ink

and wanted something tribal, something for war.

They put Tweety Bird on my butt. Yes, I think

you remind me of getting the wrong tattoo–

You're not the one I wanted, but you'll do.