Hades, Waking Up by Frances Klein

Hades, Waking Up

I get to feeling this gig’s not half bad
right up until that first cup of coffee
in the morning. We harnessed the power
of the earth’s core, you’d think we could manage
a consistent cup, but apparently
that, too, lives up to our business model:
equal opportunity torment. She
would have agreed; always slightly oily,
always slightly cold, she would instead take
pomegranate tea into her room, lock
the door, throw on The Byrds, blast turn, turn, turn
through the hallways and passageways of hell,
forgetting that the wheel of seasons would
inevitably bring her back as well.

by Frances Klein

Editor’s Note: Is a sonnet a sonnet if it doesn’t rhyme? I tend to think of poems such as this as new sonnets. Free sonnets. The volta at the end suggests that this is a sonnet despite the dearth of rhyme.