My daughter, for Christmas in 2022, wanted, as she always does, “experiences, not things” so my wife and I got tickets to a show and planned an overnight stay in Milwaukee. Now my mother, who was ninety-six at the time and suffering from dementia, was living with us. She had been with us for almost two years. It was my daughter and her grandma who shared the bed at the hotel in Milwaukee. That getaway, designed to be a gift to my daughter, turned into something else, the revelation that we were losing a part of our souls in our caregiving. It was a hard truth.
A few months later, we moved Mom into an assisted living facility in St. Petersburg, Florida, a decision we had been putting off for many years (before living with us, Mom lived with one of my brothers for four years and before that with my sister for three years). Now in assisted living, she is a few minutes away from the home of another one of my brothers.
Mom celebrated her 100th birthday May 10, 2025. Many of us, her family, from all over the country, were there to celebrate with her.
In response to a Facebook post in which a reader asked whether “She Wanted to Sleep Head to Foot” is indeed I sonnet, I wrote:
The editors of the ANTAE Journal who published my piece also disbelieved it was a sonnet. They did not maintain the fourteen-line format and listed it on the Contents page as a prose poem, which, of course it also is. In writing “She Wanted to Sleep Head to Foot” I was inspired by Diane Seuss’ collection, frank:sonnets (Seuss, Diane. 2021. frank: sonnets. Minneapolis: Graywolf Press). The Helen Schaible International Sonnet Contest, which is now open submissions for 2026, includes the following on the modern sonnet:
Some Thoughts on Defining a Modern Sonnet:
Rules about subject matter are looser than in more traditional sonnets, although modern sonnets should offer some sort of final point or insight in the closing lines. If you have questions, the following resources may help:
Rachel Richardson’s article, “Learning the Sonnet” on the Poetry Foundation’s website: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/70051/learning-the-sonnet
Litcharts article on sonnets: https://www.litcharts.com/literary-devices-and-terms/sonnet
Annie Finch’s article, “Chaos in Fourteen Lines:” https://www.cprw.com/Misc/finch2.htm
Stephanie Burt’s article in Slate: https://slate.com/culture/2019/05/terrance-hayes-sonnet-poetry-stephanie-burt.html?fbclid=IwAR2qSqnUxsnPtIDK16skYfcEUJR9APz1fZKITwxz
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JK Miller 
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