Laurel Kay, a junior, is a part of Canyon’s vast majority of unrecognized artists. Laurel took to a medium that is not as favored as it once was: a pen and paper. These are the tools she uses to create poetry unlike any other.

Laurel started writing poetry in seventh grade to cure her recurring boredom. In her words, “she entwined pre-teen angst and an absurd amount of metaphors.” Slowly, her poetry morphed into a more serious hobby with intense meaning that related to important aspects of her life. 

Laurel suffers from Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis (JRA) and Spondyloarthropathy, an arthritis that affects the spine and normally one leg, both of which is pretty uncommon in adolescents. She could not find anyone that was struggling with the same problems, so she turned to poetry as a way to cope.  

On August 5th she wrote her poem entitled “Tattoo”

“I’m sinking down from growing pains
Like blood from my own flowing veins.
That day, I don’t remember when,
But it left its dirty, ugly stains.

I know if I was your ink tattoo
And stuck to your skin like super glue,
Maybe we wouldn’t be so far apart,
And I’d finally mean something to you.

From small, clean words across your side,
Or something crude you’d want to hide,
I don’t care where I will end up,
If I never stop being your pride.

So listen to me when I tell you:
You can’t mend an angel’s wings with glue.
I beg you to watch me fall apart
As I fall to your side, an ink tattoo.

She explains that this poem was an ode to feeling ostracised by society because of the irregularity caused by her health issues. Laurel finds comfort in her ability to express herself. 

Laurel knows how to hide her inner feelings in the lines of her poems, so she writes her poems for others to interpret and find comfort in as well. 

Another one of her poems relates to a moment in her year where she feared people would break her trust. She writes:

Cliffside hanging,
Like fruit from a vine.
Are you next to me?
If so, what do you see?
Meet my eyes, life on the line.

Teetering on fear,
Holding in tears,
Eating away at that small, empty pier.

Ocean stretches,
Calm arms cradling the sun.
Earnest and resting in its hold
And writhing from things it’s told.
Nobody cares but one.

Broken, my fingers.
Realizing the end is near,
Elevated above a sharp end,
Empty prayers as I descend.
Zephyr, like a halo, lingers
Edging the tense atmosphere.

Again, my vision travels.
Gazing up to the sky.
Arid throat, but clear view.
Is what I really see new?
No one ever told me to fly.

This poem represents the ‘perfect storm’ of situations. She wrote her fear into a deadly situation so anyone reading could understand the severity of her fear.

This harbored fear was explained, metaphorically, by holding onto the cliffside. The last stanza is an almost optimistic view of the deadly ledge. The fear of letting go kept her from moving on. “Why fall to your death when you can fly?”
Her passion transcended into a coping mechanism.

Laurel writes her poems so that there is a different story upon the eye of the reader. She wants her readers to relate in their own way with their own problems.

Who doesn’t fear their own cliffside?