You're probably wondering what I'm doing here. Well, I'll tell you... It all started near the end of 7th Grade, when my English Teacher required my class to write poetry. She would select some of the best ones and publish them in a book that would be distributed to students and family.

    I thought that this was something that I might be able to be good at because I play guitar and am starting a band. I thought that I would like to write songs one day, so I struggled with a couple of poems over a week and a half. I kept writing and re-writing until I thought they were the best they could be.

    When it came time to publish the book, I was sure that at least one of my poems would be good enough for the book. I looked through the book and I didn't see either of my poems that I had worked so hard on.

    After I got home, I checked again. Sure enough, no poem. So, the next day, I asked my teacher what was wrong with my poems, and she said, "I'm sure that you just copied them off the Internet and put your name on them."

    Huh?! I told her I didn't, but it didn't make any difference at that time. She showed me some examples of other kids' poems that were copied and they just put their name on it. Plus, she said, that she had remembered reading my poems somewhere before.

    Then she asked me to point out which words I changed, that made me think that I wrote them. Really, I didn't copy them. I wrote them myself, just me and my brain.

    I just have to say that this is one of my favorite teachers, but I can't believe that she would think that I would cheat, like that. My parents tell me that this is a great compliment. It doesn't feel like a compliment when someone says you cheated on something that you worked on real hard. But they say that I should be happy because my poems were good enough that my teacher thought that a professional poet had written them.

    So, since I can't share them with my local community, I thought I could share them with the world, via the Internet.

    But, if you're looking on the Internet for some poems to put your name on and give to your teacher: DON'T USE THESE POEMS.

    You can also send me an email and tell me what you think of my poems (that I actually did write), or if you know of the poem that my teacher might have read that she thought I copied, I would like to read it, so maybe you could send it to me, or tell me where I can read it at.