Lawrence High School creative writing instructor Joy Clumsky gave her students lofty resources for their new assignment — images of some of the world’s most famous artwork.

LHS students wrote poems inspired by their intellectual and emotional response to a work of art of their choosing. Here are some of their own “masterpieces”:

“Hypnotized”

I guffaw at my teacher

Because she constantly reminds us

Not to touch the painting, precious.

Why would I want to touch

Such a prominent piece of art?

As this majestic painting

My eye catches,

It inhales me;

Enthralled, I find myself reaching up to touch it.

One grope should not hurt.

I long to graze the face of the painting

With my fingertips.

My conscience interrupts, and myself I catch,

Trying to brush the hallowed artifact.

So, I force my hand to my side,

And coerce my feet to lead away.

Vincent Van Gogh's Landscape

Even though the painting beckons to me still,

I dare not look back.

Its grand vigor

Will again hypnotize me,

And I shall stand not a chance,

And I shall not stand a chance.

By Clay Kellerman

Inspired by Vincent Van Gogh’s “Landscape With Olive Trees”

“Memory”

Waves journey up the sandy shores,

Beckoning me,

Vedder Elihu's Memory

Luring me

To their now-forbidden dwelling.

I refuse the temptation,

Knowing the hurt that the ocean endures.

The brackish water is my paradise no longer

For my adored companion has

fallen here,

Latent in his watery grave.

The exhausted sun retires from the grueling day,

Hiding behind the hovering clouds.

The knot in my throat

Grows with the darkness.

Too enraged to cry,

I curse the vicious waves instead,

Blaming them for stealing my soul,

Robbing me of the single being

Dorothea Tanning's Guardian

That brought me happiness,

And leaving me abandoned for eternity.

By Megan Klingler

Inspired by Vedder Elihu’s “Memory”

“Delirium”

Fear,

Tightly pressed

Into a corner,

Is feasted upon

By the demons

That lurk

In the shadows.

Fright,

The bait

Which reels in

Dark spirits,

Is hung

By a hook

In the sea of nightmare.

Looking for an escape,

I find none.

I search for a light

Brighter than the sun.

Far from this world,

I will extend;

My guardian takes me

Before this dream ends.

By Daniela Archibong

Inspired by Dorothea Tanning’s “Guardian Angels.”

“Redemption”

In this world,

I wonder if The Lord is dead,

For I have been praying

And waiting so long.

The sunrise feels so distant;

Jean-Francois Millet's The

The moon is so pale.

The grass and the forest

Seize the raindrops,

Like the sun to the sky.

He warned me not to run,

For he would whip me

To the fiery embers of hell.

Everything is tranquil by my footsteps.

The dogs I hear,

But I can’t distinguish the number.

Yesterday,

I was just another cotton-picking chattel,

Today,

I flee to freedom,

Today,

I flee to freedom,

May it not be in a grave.

By Pharouk Hussein

Inspired by Jean-Francois Millet’s “The Gleaners.”

“Morning Haven”

Man slowly wakes from night’s gracious repose.

Night yields to advent of the day.

To my seaside haven I retreat,

Claude Monet's Impression,

For sleep no longer can allay me.

I watch the torpid harbor slowly stir to life.

The sun burns low through the ashen atmosphere,

Its brilliance intense upon the unstirring sea surface.

A few lone seamen drift below,

Shrouded in morning mist.

A dream-like haze obscures my vision.

Steadfast, I absorb the fleeting tableau before me

Before obdurate time may steal it away.

I commit each resplendent sight to memory,

The sights stored safely in my mind,

While I thrive euphoric in my haven.

By Valerie Wiesner

Inspired by Claude Monet’s “Impression, Sunrise”