Prof of Profs- Jacob Young

I was a math major—fond of all things rational.

It was the first day of my first poetry class.

The prof, with the air of a priest at Latin mass,

told us that we could “make great poetry personal,”

could own it, since poetry we memorize sings

inside us always. By way of illustration

he began reciting Shelley with real passion,

but stopped at “Ozymandias, King of Kings;

Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”—

because, with that last plosive, his top denture

popped from his mouth and bounced off an empty chair.

He blinked, then offered, as postscript to his lecture,   

a promise so splendid it made me give up math:

“More thingth like that will happen in thith clath."

The rhyme scheme goes as follows: ABBA, CDDC, EFE, FGG

It seems to follow a modified Petrarchan sonnet scheme, as there is an octave split in half and a sestet split in half. The reason for why he goes about this scheme is because throughout the first two quatrains, the narrator feels negatively about poetry and the class. However, the shift occurs after the first terset when the narrator claims that he gave up math. The author makes these tersets separate because he emphasizes the humor and spontanaiety of the events that occurred. By not following the traditional form, the author isolates the dentures popping out of the professor's mouth as something funny, important, and spontaneous. It even inspires the narrator to change his college major from math. He further emphasizes the last terset with all 3 lines being end-stopped, so each line stands out on its own. The caesura in the first line of the sonnet also shows how the narrator was very much not enthusiastic about learning poetry, which is not rational in the least bit. He even takes shots at the professor at first, by saying he had the air of a Latin priest. The poet's message in this sonnet is that poetry can be exciting, spontaneous, and unrealistic, and it certainly has the power to drastically change people's lives. By something as simple and humorous as a professor's dentures falling out, poetry has the capability to cause a dramatic shift in a person's life. 

I chose this sonnet because it is entertaining and funny, and very relatable. A lot of students have had a single experience in a class that changed their studies dramatically.