Aran Sonnad-Joshi: this year's Georgia Poet Laureate's Prize winner

The Georgia Council for the Arts has recently announced Atlanta's Midtown High School senior Aran Sonnad-Joshi as the winner of the 2022 Poet Laureate Prize. (Suzy Hazelwood/ Pexels)

The renowned poet Rita Dove has said, ‘Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful.’ Georgia poet Chelsea Rathburn and the Georgia Council for the Arts recently announced the winner and finalists for this year’s ninth annual Poet Laureate Prize, awarded to a Georgia high school student for an original poem.

The winner of that distinction is Atlanta’s Midtown High School senior Aran Sonnad-Joshi. He joined “City Lights” host Lois Reitzes to share his original work and talk about his connection to the art of poetry.

Re-printed below is the full text of Aran Sonnad-Joshi’s prize-winning poem, “The Stargazer.”