It’s Possible Sex is Elegy, by Chelsea Dingman

Chelsea Dingman’s first book, Thaw, was chosen by Allison Joseph to win
the National Poetry Series (University of Georgia Press, 2017). In 2016-17,
she also won The Southeast Review’s Gearhart Poetry Prize, The Sycamore
Review’s Wabash Prize, and Water-stone Review’s Jane Kenyon Poetry Prize.
Visit her website: chelseadingman.com.


About the poem:
This poem originated from a conversation with a colleague as to what the sonnet
form can be after reading a series of Terrance Hayes’ new sonnets. I wrote it the
week that the #metoo campaign exploded online & I used this form as a sort of cage
for the content. Breaking the traditional form, even slightly, feels like the smallest
act of resistance for this speaker.