Category: Poetry

2017 Poetry Contest, Honorable Mention: “My Ancestors” by Ron Reikki

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We’re happy to announce “My Ancestors” by Ron Riekki as an Honorable Mention in our 2017 Poetry Contest! A special shout-out to our hard-working poetry staff for this round!

.                My Ancestors

My grandmother’s grandmother hid,
buried herself under handfuls of history,

and now I am discovering—through the thaw
of genocide—the glaciers of bravery

in my Arctic blood, my Jewish blood,
my Muslim blood, my multiracial story.

 

Ron Riekki‘s books include U.P.: a novel (Sewanee Writers Series and Great Michigan Read nominated), The Way North: Collected Upper Peninsula New Works (2014 Michigan Notable Book from the Library of Michigan and finalist for the Eric Hoffer Book Award/Grand Prize shortlist, Midwest Book Award, Foreword Book of the Year, and Next Generation Indie Book Award), Here: Women Writing on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (2016 IPPY/Independent Publisher Book Award Gold Medal Great Lakes—Best Regional Fiction and Next Generation Indie Book Award—Short Story finalist), and And Here: 100 Years of Upper Peninsula Writing, 1917-2017 (Michigan State University Press, 2017).

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2017 Poetry Contest, Honorable Mention: “Rorschach Test” by Charles Kell

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We’re excited to announce “Rorschach Test” by Charles Kell as an Honorable Mention in our 2017 Poetry Contest! A special thank you to our hard-working poetry staff for their work this time around!

Rorschach Test

Blink if you see a pain-devil.
Make a left fist if you notice your ma
slicing bread.
Wipe the wet when you make out your dead
.       father.
Black morphs into blue shadows who ring
themselves around your heart handle.
Your first girl’s red hair.
Third boy’s bruise.
There, see a football softly floating off
the edge of a cliff.
Tap your right toe twice if you catch
the river swallowing a lost boy.
Your childhood dog, Bear, wagging its black
.     tail.
The Amish man who cut his finger off behind
you in the sawmill.
Close your eyes if you can see your jail cell.
Sit up straight if you see the unlocking gait.
Open your eyes if you can see inside
your still-locked cell

 

Charles Kell is a PhD student at The University of Rhode Island and editor of The Ocean State Review. His poetry and fiction have appeared in The New Orleans Review, The Saint Ann’s Review, IthacaLit, and elsewhere. He teaches in Rhode Island and Connecticut.

2017 Poetry Contest, Honorable Mention: “The ONE” by Claire Scott

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We’re excited to announce “The ONE” by Claire Scott as an Honorable Mention in our 2017 Poetry Contest. A special thank you to our poetry staff for their hard work this season! 

 

The ONE

 

a different woman to marry he’d met 
a hazed gauze of gin or bourbon or both
at Sam’s or was it Saul’s or Whiskey Thieves
last night last week last month
just knew god-dammit he knew
she was the One
critical tell Marci urgent at once must
he must end of the line finita la commedia or is it tragedia
no more nagging carping dirty dishes
or drifting home past two am
because here she is
the very One right next to him right now
head spinning perfume heart stopping
Gilbeys whirling with Wild Turkey
in a wavering two-three stumble
so smart discussing entropy & black holes
while he looked down her shirt
fractals & force fields
his hand on her thigh
she was from Scarsdale Sacramento Scranton
spines making music caduceus or is it cadacious
he left Marci so sorry a message
a dead road dead ended road block no going back
staggered to the men’s
spiffed up a bit, hair pushed off blurred face
finally on track he was sprinting
around spinning spiraling around
a straight shot to paradise

 

her stool empty  
the One poof! abracadabra
only a faint waft of Guerlain
an untouched glass
home lurched crash landed
into a house full of echoes
keys on kitchen table
clothes cut into neat squares
spread across the floor
a crazed checkerboard
of suits & shirts & ties
what the hell was her name

 

Claire Scott is an award winning poet who has been nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize. Her work has been accepted by the Atlanta Review, Bellevue Literary Review, Enzagam and Healing Muse among others. Claire is the author of Waiting to be Called and the co-author of Unfolding in Light: A Sisters’ Journey in Photography and Poetry.

2017 Poetry Contest, Honorable Mention: “A Sailor’s Language” by Taunja Thomson

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We’re proud to announce “A Sailor’s Language” by Taunja Thomson as an honorable mention for a 2017 Spring Poetry Contest! A specials thanks to our poetry staff for all of their hard work!

A Sailor’s Language

I am a music box
only I can wind up—
no pirouetting
but a sharp unfolding.
I don pink eye shadow
blow mauve bubbles
put a rose collar
on my lucky cat
yet my frown is grey
my wallpaper storm clouds
and the inside of my box
once velvet
is creased and stained.
I can wind up toy mice
release thin-skinned
balloons and watch the sun
rise. I can also pick
at wounds
keen for the moon
wear heavy curves
and jagged knuckles.
I am Girl
the one you thought was soft
ripe and yours.
Now you know I am not
apple or apron my mother’s eyes
my father’s fawn—
I release myself across fields
and into mountains
cross rivers
navigate oceans
wear a sailor’s language.

 

Taunja Thomson’s poetry has most recently appeared in Peacock Journal and Zingara. Two of her poems have been nominated for Pushcart Awards: “Seahorse and Moon” in 2005 and “I Walked Out in January” in 2016. She has co-authored a chapbook of ekphrastic poetry which has recently been accepted for publication and has a writer’s page at https://www.facebook.com/TaunjaThomsonWriter. A worshiper of nature, her summers are filled with water gardening, and her winters are spent obsessively feeding the birds and other wildlife that appear in her one-acre slice of heaven, a field.

Poetry Spring 2017, Honorable Mention: “On Your Wedding Day” by Stephen Barichko

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On Your Wedding Day
a toast
.     when i was seventeen i still lived or perished by the promise
.     so when you twined my ring finger knotted it tight and said this means
 .    we’re married now I believed you because that day in the morning
.     down in the brook we sloshed up to our knees in cold then dampened
      our steps as we neared the resting trout your hands swirling the wet
river dust
.     part of the spell to calm the slow gulping column of muscle sleeping
in the dirt
.     that let you raise it to the world of no suspension while it held its breath 
.     and you placed my hand along yours along the body and stilled me 
.     and taught me that pulses and heartbeats could be felt if you dimmed all
.     else to the singularity in front of you
Stephen Barichko is a writer from Terryville, CT. He lives on his farm in Terryville with his wife.

Poetry Spring 2017, Honorable Mention: “How to Talk to the Dying” by Jessica Mehta

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We received an extraordinary number of wonderful submissions for our 2017 Poetry content, and have a number of honorable mentions to name thanks to the diligent work of our poetry staff. We’re proud to announce “How to Talk to the Dying” by Jessica Mehta as an honorable mention!

How to Talk to the Dying

I looked up What to say
to the dying because words
get stuck in my hands. There’s no good
answers. You died the same

way our father did, yellow skin
and lion eyes. What do you say

to your sister out

on the reservation? I love you,
that’s it. Your husband told me

you smiled and poured
your own Love
you back into me

all the way down
through the wires. The voice

deep, dark and foreign
like a strangers’ always is.

 

Jessica Mehta: “I’m a Cherokee poet, novelist, and author of four collections of poetry including Secret-Telling Bones, Orygun, What Makes an Always, and The Last Exotic Petting Zoo as well as one novel and a non-fiction book. Over 100 of my pieces have appeared in magazines and journals around the world. I was awarded five poet-in-residency posts for 2017 in the UK, France and US.”

Poetry Spring 2017, Fifth Place: “September” by Conyer Clayton

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We received an extraordinary number of amazing submission for our first poetry contest of the year, and it took much hard work from our poetry staff to make the final decisions. Congratulations to Conyer Clayton for taking fifth place in the Spring Poetry Contest of 2017!

 

September

Held under nail and lining, sodden foot,
glances laced with suspicious fidelity,
.                                                                             knocked asunder

by your level head, prompt reliability, judicious
punctuality. I grind through ropes, mealy strands,

locking fibers in my gums, flicking with my tongue
.                                                                               while my mother

grips my arm, crying in an alleyway, begging me to look her in the eye.

 

 

Conyer Clayton is a poet born in Louisville, Kentucky, who currently enjoys her Canadian permanent residency in Ottawa. When she isn’t busy coaching gymnastics by day, she attempts to make use of her Master’s degree in English from the University of Louisville. Her poetry has most recently been published or is forthcoming both online and in print with Bywords, Transom, NILVX, FLUX, Fishfood Magazine, and PACE. You can find news about her poetic endeavors and collaborations on facebook.com/ConyerClayton.