2018 Fall Contest, Theme – Harvest, Honorable Mentions and Judge’s Comments

Honorable mentions:
1st Honorable Mention: “The Sugar Cane at Harvest Bears Witness” by Nancy Flynn, Portland, OR
2nd Honorable Mention: “A Little Thanksgiving” by Leah Stenson, Portland, OR
3rd Honorable Mention: “Fruit Preserves in Glass Jars” by Nancy Christopherson, Baker City, OR

Judge’s comments
Sixty-odd poems. Some I surmise were written specifically for the contest. There were epics—as epic as one can be in 40 lines—of harvest scenes, as detailed nineteenth-century landscape paintings. First honorable mention “The Sugar Cane at Harvest Bears Witness” is a sestina retelling an event that began the Haitian Revolution. Vivid descriptions and language. “A Little Thanksgiving” cleverly follows the path of an apple through many hands on its travels. “Fruit Preserves in Glass Jars” combines a cook’s reminiscences of seasonal cooking with a conversational tone. It also has my favorite line of all the poems in this category, “The oranges flew all the way from Florida on their own wings.”
—Michael Hanner

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