Students are shoulder to shoulder each day in the hallways, but how much do they really know about the people walking next to them? This series will feature the students of FHS along with their talents, hobbies and passions. “A Closer Look” is meant to showcase what makes the students of FHS who they are.

Everyone has a hobby; a passion, pastime, interest or talent. Whether it’s a sport, writing, painting or acting, everyone has something they enjoy. For junior Samantha Halbert, that pursuit is poetry.  

Halbert began writing poetry in middle school, but her love for it really took off at the beginning of her high school career. “Writing poems was never my thing,” Halbert said. That is, until she began attending Literature Club with a few of her friends at AGS Middle School. This club was a “great experience” for Halbert. “A friend made the club,” she said. “It was a fun place. We made poetry and shared our poems—even though my poems didn’t make sense back then.”

Halbert writes her poetry for fun, “regardless of how people view them,” she claimed. She still hopes to convey real, contemplative concepts through her work. “A sense of hopelessness, something that can’t be reached,” Halbert said.

“What I like about writing poetry is the freedom of making whatever I want,” Halbert explained. “The thinking, how my poems share their words, how it connects, the world building and how my creation grows.” 

Her poetry writing process is a fairly simple, yet an effective process. Halbert takes concepts and subjects from her previously written poems and adds to them while also providing something new and fresh to her work. “In some ways,” Halbert said, “I take inspiration from what I’ve already written.”

Aside from poems, Halbert also writes short stories. “The short stories I make revolve around my poems,” she said. The ideas and themes of her work are pretty consistent and most often concentrate on the horror and mystery tropes. 

A poem written by Halbert can be seen below. 

“Poor dog, lost half its body, lost its face, now with new. Metal wires support its neck, its new legs. Only joy is its bundle of wires. Living its life in misery.”