1st Honorable Mention: “Stage Four” by Jackie McManus, Lyle, WA 2nd Honorable Mention: “Someday” by Mary Theis, Talent, OR 3rd Honorable Mention: “Unraveling” by Norm Baxter, Salem, OR Judge’s comments In reading this year’s batch of poems, I was stirred with how, throughout the whole of these poems, resounds a clear and overarching note of
2019 Fall Contest, New Poets: Honorable Mentions and Judge’s Comments Read More »
Gifted by Diana Morley Death comes sudden, so I hear, heart gives out or mishap: ladder tipped, car crash… Yet some lives linger, some die slowly—move closer day by day, one by one, no news—dying soft as they live on the go right to the last day when they know it’s time for leaving, for
2019 Fall Contest Winner: Traditional Form—1st Place, Blank Verse Read More »
The Prince: First Anniversary by Carolyn Martin She will not let it go: her narrative about shape-shifting steeds and bullying step-relatives. I’ve begged her to delete the past and re-compose her life. I can’t, she turns her back on me. Not now. Not yet. The fact is she electrified that night. The metaphor of lightning
2019 Fall Contest Winner: Traditional Form—2nd Place, Blank Verse Read More »
Elegy for Hands by Susan Morse My hands are like a tree. Cut them open Expose the rings. Take notice, I tell you! Cupped upon my fingers, ten moons, each one unique with its own spots, mapped with imprints of this world, whole histories carved within. My left hand the sluggard, unlearned—the right, ambitious, pimp
2019 Fall Contest Winner: Traditional Form—Blank Verse, 3rd Place Read More »
1st Honorable Mention: “Full Moons” by Susanne Twight-Alexander, Eugene, OR 2nd Honorable Mention: “The Dandelion’s Rant” by Paul Telles, Beaverton, OR 3rd Honorable Mention: “Finding My Song” by Barbara Blanks, Garland, TX
2019 Fall Contest, Traditional Form—Blank Verse: Honorable Mentions Read More »
The Porch in Summer by Lynn Robertson In the deep of heat, sides of laid-out dogs rise shallow-quick, their tongues loll limp, dirt crust fringes their foaming drool. Wasps circle haze, as if they were a crumble of leaves with no whisk of wind to carry them away. Like an old man’s temper a film
2019 Fall Contest Winner: Theme—Our Common Life, 1st Place Read More »
Abatement by Suzy Harris Against this hundred-year house, ladders rise up from one story to the next, and the paint is scraped away, bit by bit, exposing raw boards to the bright August sun. Men covered in white suits call back and forth like in a church, call and response. They build a chapel of
2019 Fall Contest Winner: Theme—Our Common Life, 2nd Place Read More »
Yakima Valley Libraries, in Washington State, is now accepting self-published, independent, and small-press titles for inclusion in our new Local & Regional Author Collection (LRAC). The driving idea behind this collection is to provide a special space and readership for our local and regional self-published and small press authors that often don’t meet our criteria
Debris by Stephanie Striffler you and I pick our way through tsunami debris claws of bare tree up-ended tires Harley Davidson soccer ball the task has fallen to us an ocean away to fill bags with ragged styrofoam remnants forever undegradable oyster farm buoys stamped with undecipherable characters carried from a disaster more than
2019 Fall Contest Winner: Theme—Our Common Life, 3rd Place Read More »
1st Honorable Mention: “The Neighbor Brings a Boat Home” by Colette Jonopulos, Denver, CO 2nd Honorable Mention: “Facing the Light” by Jana Carp, Salem, OR 3rd Honorable Mention: “Earth: An Abecedarian Ode” by Alida Rol, Eugene, OR Judge’s comments Judging poetry is always weighty. We are tasked with selecting one poem over another and ranking
2019 Fall Contest, Theme—Our Common Life: Honorable Mentions and Judge’s Comments Read More »
