Congratulations to the 2022-23 Honors Poetry Thesis students! Honors Poetry Thesis is a two-semester course that culminates a thousand lines (minimum) of original poetry. These poets have worked tirelessly since the Fall of 2022 to craft books of poetry that sing vulnerable songs of joy and desire.
Caroline Brogden is from Apex, North Carolina. She will graduate in May with a bachelor’s degree in Geography. She turns to poetry as a formal practice of paying attention.
Gina Flow’s poems use nature to make a myth of a family’s history. They make every day a beautiful, recognizable, and unrecognizable song full of tobacco and birds.
Chelsea Hignite is a biology major originally from Kernersville, North Carolina. She first turned to writing poetry in the spring of her sophomore year of college as a way to work through the juxtaposition of joy, love, heartbreak, and grief.
Cecil May is a senior English and Studio Art double major with a minor in Music. They decided to write poetry because being a court jester and peddling riddles are not viable career choices in modern society, and this was the next best thing.
Mike O’Brien is a senior studying Psychology, Creative Writing, and Environmental Science. In middle school, Mike started writing poems in the margins of exams to pass the time—after taking an introductory poetry course his freshman year of college, he realized there was nothing he’d rather pass the time doing.
Quinton Okoro is an English & Comparative Literature major concentrating in Creative Writing. As Quintion states, “I write poetry because it is the only thing I can do.”
Aryani Pallerla is a senior studying Neuroscience. She turned to the writing of poetry initially to express her feelings and emotions in a new medium.
Megan Pramojaney is a double major in Physics and English. Growing up, life and her relationship with it, especially as a biased and flawed individual, has both fascinated and vexed her. She has also struggled, and still struggles, with finding her response to both the expectations created by her community and the ones she created for herself. Poetry has since become, for her, a vehicle to slow down and reconnect with the subconsciously locked parts of her past.
Lila Richardson is tumbling out of her UNC career with a Creative Writing & Geography double major and a sweet little minor in Music. She found writing in the act of answer-seeking.
