It was a late summer night, around 2 a.m. Senior Porsha Clontz was awake, tirelessly writing. With every thought and feeling flowing onto each page, she felt purpose and freedom. Her experiences, her love, her happiness and even her sadness were taken from her and translated into vivid literary arrangements.

“My poetry is my own,” she says in one of her poems titled “Literary Language.” “It’s my own language, in which I am fluent. My poetry is me. It is what I wish to say when verbal words fail me.”

Unknowingly, one poem had started to spark a new passion in her, beginning something she couldn’t walk away from.

Clontz published her poetry collection, “Red Violets and Blue Roses,” Dec. 3 last year. She started her writing journey in the spring of 2023, from then on writing in her free time and through her creative writing class. It was from that spring on that she began taking her writing more seriously, preparing her poetry book.

She started writing this collection in the summer of 2023, after she had made a love poem, which prompted a new beginning. She felt a connection to poetry, to get her feelings on paper, and to honestly write. It was important to her.

“Writing gives me a sense of purpose and a sense of release,” Clontz said. “Especially when writing poetry, it allows me to process my emotions and write them down.”

More than just a personal purpose, Porsha wrote this collection to connect with people. Her goal in publishing the collection was to put something out for other people to feel and connect with when they read.

“I knew if I shared it, somebody could match up with the experiences and kind of feel them,” Clontz said.

The idea came about randomly as she continued to write poems. Eventually, when she wanted to make a collection, she found that sorting them into different categories that made sense worked best. The central themes of the collection focus on love, flowers and overwhelming feelings. These tie into each section, the title, and opening poem, which share a unique name.

“I came up with the idea for red violets and blue roses, because I was so tired of hearing roses are red violets are blue,” Clontz said. “So I flipped the script and started with that. I wanted an original title.”

Writing and publishing a poem is no easy feat. This process was not without obstacles. During writing, she faced periods of writer’s block, making it hard to continue. Clontz said she spent many late nights writing, editing and arranging poems with little help. She was independent in this pursuit.

“I did edit and arrange the book myself,” Clontz said. “The writing process was the same. Just me and my cats, who tried walking across my keyboard while I was writing.”

Though independently writing and managing, Clontz had some support along the way. With teachers and friends cheering her on through it all.

“I can tell you that I saw her passion for poetry from the first day she stepped into my creative writing class,” creative writing teacher Neil Corbett said. “In a world where real art is quickly being eclipsed by cheap, lazy slop, it’s a beautiful thing to see a young artist put in the effort to see her dreams realized.”

A friend and beta reader, who was actually one of the first to read the collection, shared this feeling.

”She’s been looking forward to this for a couple of years,” junior Revelee Cote said. “It was amazing to see it come out. It really is.”

“Red Violets and Blue Roses” is available on Amazon, and now that the collection is in readers’ hands, Porsha is looking ahead. She has plans to release more collections and has already begun work on one titled “Garden of Hollow Stems.”

“I hope that anyone who reads my collection enjoys it, but also finds themselves in my poems,” Clontz said. “I hope that at least something of my writing impacts someone else.”

You can purchase a copy of Porsha’s book on Amazon here.