We Count Those Years - Sam Lu

We count those years to weeks to days.
Anticipation in our gaze,
That final day is drawing near.
This vessel presses to our pier,
A flag of change, she boldly sways.

And some of us, we feel malaise.
And some, we wish of better stays.
And all we, with rearviews to peer,
We count those years.

In sunshine, faces all ablaze,
The summertime will bloom bouquets.
A backdrop for our last days here,
As we go to a new frontier.
And when we look back on our ways,
We count those years.


This is a rondeau I wrote. It talks about the feelings and thoughts that go through my mind as I think of graduation from high school. It is written in iambic tetrameter, painstakingly counted and kept. It fits my theme because it is set in the summer. The rhyme scheme of this poem is that of a typical rondeau, A A B B A A A B with refrain C A A B B A with concluding refrain C. Literary devices used in this poem include: metaphor of approaching graduation as a ship nearing to dock, waving a flag of change; symbols, as the bouquets mentioned are a symbol for Prom, as corsages, a bouquet of flowers, are a Prom tradition; and repetition, as seen in all of the second stanza.