Daniella looked out into the crowd. Imogen was there, smiling her ghost of a smile. Next to her was Rinn, nodding in that encouraging way that she had.

Daniella had no idea if she could do this. But she decided she would anyway. She had to try.

“‘In truth the sun does not rise.’” Her voice was too quiet, she knew.

Daniella took another breath.

And then another. “‘But Earth spins with all her might.’”

Just keep breathing, and maybe you won’t vomit everywhere. “‘To bear creation.’”

That was really the end of the sonnet. Daniella had finished the rest of the poem and had snapped a photo of it. But when she spoke it out loud, she knew she needed to say the ending couplet first. Knew she needed it to begin where the poem finished, for the symmetry of it.

She kept going, kept speaking. Maybe it wasn’t any good. But maybe it was enough just to hear it out loud for herself. “‘Each morning the day will break with new light.’”

Her voice grew stronger, grew more intense. “‘While each night the sun flies far from the sky.’”

Daniella looked up, saw the crowd. Their faces were neutral, impassive. She closed her eyes briefly and then on an exhale recited the next line. “‘When the morning comes with the sun’s new cry, yet again she is born fresh and full bright.’”

The faces in the crowd blurred. She didn’t register them anymore. Didn’t know who they were. Didn’t care. This wasn’t about their reaction. She knew it mattered. But it wasn’t about that. “‘Just when you think the end is in whole sight—born from end is the beginning up high.’”

She had found her rhythm now. She’d found her pacing. The poem was like music, one beat following the next, each sound taking the form. “‘In shrouds of clouds, the night attempts to wry the sun’s light. The moon leaves the starless night, for fear of being the sun’s epistle.’”

She knew some of the words were old-fashioned. “‘Fear of the black, fear of what will unearth.’”

They were supposed to be old-fashioned. She was anachronistic on purpose. Looking for old forms. Looking for new ways. Her voice grew softer, but not from her own fears. Because the poem needed that sensation, and she had to give the poem its due. “‘Fear of the pain, fear of trepidation.’”

And here was the grand finale. Proof that she hadn’t just written a couplet about a hangover, though the hangover had prompted all the imagery. “‘’Tis folly that we see not a cycle: For in truth, the sun does not rise, but Earth spins with all her might to bear creation.’”