All-Ages Poetry Contest: we have our winners!

Children

K-3 grade

1. Kathryn Mierzejewski

   Kathryn Mierzejewski wrote the following three poems:

   • As Sure As Squirrels Eat Nuts

     As sure as squirrels eat nuts,
     Spring will come and go.
     Summer's up, now Fall's ending.
     It's as sure as snow. Winter flurries by,
     now it's Spring again.
     As sure as squirrels eat nuts,
     It'll happen all over again.

   • Ladybug Ladies

     In the garden that I keep,
     I watch the ladybugs as they daintily leap from leaf to leaf
     as a ladybug lady, all delicate and neat.

   • Morning Serenade

     In the morning, I wake up to such a lovely sound,
     the robins, blue jays, larks, all serenading me so happily.
     I know I'll wake up to the same happy sound tomorrow
     morning, yippie!!!!!

2. Mallory Hartsell

   Mallory Hartsell wrote the following two poems:

   • A World of Differences

     Black & White
     Dark & Light
     Sound & Silence
     Day & Night
     If we didn't have both
     And we only had one
     Our world wouldn't be complete
     And wouldn't be much fun

   • Wind

     Making a soft, whispery sound
     Gently tossing things off their mound
     Creeping slowly, not leaving a trace
     Rising and falling, visiting every place

3. Tied for 3rd Place:
   • Andrea Drews

     The Pizzeria's Surprise

     Oh, Pizzeria, your cold tile floor,
     With peppers and mushrooms and olives galore,

     Your hot creamy cheese is oh so silky,
     Your ice-cream dessert is just so milky,

     The chefs always say "It will be just a while,"
     Soon they're at your table with a smile,

     Here is your pizza with extra cheese,
     May I see your credit card please?

     Every few seconds people race through the door,
     Soon, all of the people take up the whole floor,

     Then the chefs say "I'll have to serve fast,"
     Now guess what, some people start signing while
     they're walking in; they're called the cast,

     First they start singing, "Turn up the Heat,"
     Then they start singing Sesame Street!

     The chefs started laughing at the Sesame part,
     They laughed even harder when a member shot a blue dart,

     The customers were tempted again to eat the cheesy smelling pizza,
     Just then the actors sang a song by Wiz Khalifa!

     Boy oh boy were the customers hungry to eat their yummy treat,
     When the chefs served them, they saw a platter of small dinosaur feet!

   • Iris Gould

     Iris Gould wrote the following two poems:

     • Unicorn

       Gold spiral, wind yourself
       Out of the creature's head.
       With power you come to heal
       And give strength to those who need it so.

       Magic creature, a relative of a horse.
       Your pure white body gleams in the sun.
       And your mane twinkles all the time.

       Who am I?

     • Horses

       When the night sky comes
       The horses come
       Manes twinkling in the moonlight.
       Galloping in between trees,
       And neighing to the horizon.
       All different colors,
       In a big and beautiful herd.

4-6 grade

1. Meredith Detweiler

   Meredith Detweiler wrote the following three poems:

   • Lashes

     Anger
     To the fingertips.
     Screaming
     Thoughts off of my lips.
     I just want her
     To pay for this
     Stupid
     Maddening
     Heartfelt
     Saddening
     Wrongness.

   • I Wish

     I wish it wouldn't hurt.
     I wish I couldn't
     Feel the burn.
     I wish that ripping papers
     Made it permanently okay.
     I wish I was secure—
     For more than just a day.
     I wish someone would hold me,
     Just hang on and not let go.
     I wish I knew
     When to jump at chances
     But you know
     I'm kind of slow.
     I wish I had someone to talk to
     Someone that would understand.
     Maybe then,
     (Well, it's a wish)
     My life
     Wouldn't be
     That bad

   • Almost Gone

     It's gone
     Like a dream.
     I don't think
     It a memory.

     It happened so fast
     An eleven minute cartoon.
     Average high school drama
     Ending by noon.

     The only thing left.
     Is that poem I wrote.
     It's proof that was real.
     It gives me false hope.

2. Owen Burnham

   Owen Burnham wrote the following two poems:

   • Thunderstorm

     The rumble in the distance
     That many fear,
     The lightning flashing
     The storm is near.

     I spy the dark clouds
     I shiver in the cold,
     As the rain pours down
     I drop the things I hold.

     I take out a blanket
     And sleep for the night,
     I hope in the morning
     There will be light.

   • Willow Tree

     I sit and wait
     Under a willow tree,
     I feel sad
     And with no glee.

     The colors flash
     Around my head,
     But I feel so sad
     I can't go to bed.

     To explain the reason
     Why I'm sad,
     The death of the new
     It is quite bad.

     It came unexpected
     Unnoticeable too,
     It wasn't supposed to happen
     No one had a clue.

     All I realize
     Is sadness and fear,
     But the very next day
     I'm sure to be here.

     I let myself go
     Right there to thee,
     As my spirit flows
     Under a willow tree.

3. Lizzie Croop

   Lizzie Croop wrote the following three poems:

   • Summer

     Singing, dancing playing, laughing
     Unbelievable sunshine
     Miraculous fun
     Magical times
     Ever so beautiful
     Radiant skies

   • Brothers and sisters

     Brothers and sisters
     They never leave your side, not ever
     I will always love you

   • Books

     Books are a story, a fairytale, a quest
     They suck you up into a magical world where you're the guest

Teens

7-8 grade

1. Cora Reichert

   The Annunciation

   Above what you could ask or think,
   Beyond above to worlds unknown,
   Called God an angel to the earth,
   Directly sent from heavens' throne.

   Embers were his thousand eyes,
   Feathers clothed six burnished wings.
   Glorious fear strikes those who see
   Heavens' guards, the seraphim.

   In history, the seraph passed
   Just heavens' door to worlds still known.
   Knew the message clear did he, and
   Lo, to a dusty door he'd flown.

   Mary rose from the fireside.
   Naught she heard but sensed him, she.
   Opened the door, and through 't he glide.
   "Peace," he said, "God's grace to thee."

   Questioning overrode her fear;
   Relying on her God, she'd trust.
   Still, who was this to have faith in?
   The angel Gabriel, and she must.

   Under the door-frame Gabriel stood, and
   Voiced the age-old jubilant word:
   "Woman, thou hast found favor with God–
   eXceeding great joy, for prayers have been heard!

   You have been chosen to bear God's own son.
   Zeal for him have you, blest chosen one!"

2. Carolyn Chen

   Carolyn Chen wrote the following two poems:

   • Romeo and Juliet

     Star-crossed lovers, never to be,
     Only in death could they be free.

     A war amongst bloodlines, Montague and Capulet.
     A love caught in the feud, Romeo and Juliet.

     A forbidden love, impassioned like fire.
     Unspeakable affairs, yet aflame with desire.

     Death and blood raged, to Death many would go.
     If the carnage ever stopped, only time would show.

     Everything seemed hopeless, but all was not lost.
     There was an escape, but one with the ultimate cost.

     So in the end, they promised to love forever.
     Hand in hand, they welcomed Death together.

   • Ethereal Dream

     I remember flying
     Through clear azure skies.
     A feeling ignites deep within,
     Within a dark forgotten corner, now luminous.
     A flicker,
     A ripple of long abandoned hope
     Appears like a blink of sunlight,
     Reflecting the colors that swim deep within an ocean.
     But like every fantasy, the sun begins to cloud.
     The magnificent colors begin to fade and vanish back into black menacing seas.
     Gossamer wings no more, I begin to fall.

3. Tim Majidzadeh

   Tim Majidzadeh wrote the following two poems:

   • The Winding Trail

     The cavalry rode on and on,
     Upon the winding trail,
     Which called to them, soft as silk,
     Reach my end...if you can!

     The cavalry rode on and on,
     Upon the winding trail,
     Through twisted wood and tangled jungle,
     Earnestly trying to reach the end.

     The cavalry rode on and on,
     Upon the winding trail,
     Through arid heat and scorching desert,
     Obsessively trying to reach the end.

     The cavalry rode on and on,
     Upon the winding trail,
     Through the tall green grass, while stalked by lions,
     Mindlessly trying to reach the end.

     The cavalry rode on and on,
     Upon the winding trail,
     When suddenly the leader called a halt,
     And said, with a frog in his throat,
     "We're... We're back where we began!"

   • Creation

     What shall I create, I wondered,
     As I sat upon the rickety wooden chair.
     A myriad of possibilities
     Flying like bees around my hair.

     I could create untold horrors
     From glowing liquids and foul concoctions
     A monster with the strength of a million men,
     Creepies, crawlies, poisons, toxins...

     Should I create inventions?
     The floor to the ceiling covered in blueprints,
     Lasers, spaceships, robots, portals
     A key as thin as a fingerprint!

     Perhaps I should shape history
     Watch Egypt rise from its humble start
     Bask in the glory of the Renaissance
     Or see war tear Rome apart.

     I could go on an epic adventure
     As swords clash and arrows fly
     A tyrannical empire, a lowborn hero
     But is it necessary his friends must die?

     Maybe a magical fantasy
     Witches, warlocks, knights, demons, ghouls
     A mighty king's noble quest
     Yet how strange; everybody is a fool!

     Maybe I should be realistic
     I should try something that could happen today
     I could simply go through school, make a friend,
     And go to sleep after every day.

     Alas, too many choices, how could I pick one?
     Each has its merit, great things each has done.
     I know I must choose, but oh, the other is fun!

     After long thought, I pick the one that is greater
     Decision in mind, with long days ahead
     I put my pen to the paper.

9-12 grade

1. Luke Williams

   Luke Williams wrote the following three poems:

   • Along the Thames

     The sunlight shone gold against the hands
     of the clock on the tower high
     the great gold orb of the setting sun
     lay dying in the purple sky
     the violet waves sparkled as they fought
     to be highest among their kin
     lit bright by the light of the setting sun
     in the midst of the twilight dim

     the waves of the river lay deep and dark,
     flowing fast like a charging horse,
     rushing swiftly, beneath the sun's last glow
     towards the great ocean on their course
     and all the clouds lay carelessly,
     tossed through the great domain
     by the hand of a Titan, or so it seemed;
     in stillness and rest they remained

     it was on this night, this glorious eve
     as I looked from the balcony
     out over the Thames and sprawling city
     to this great, wondrous panoply
     I beheld the roofs, their tops all gilded
     dark gold by the setting rays,
     the towers and spires of the churches,
     all aiming where heaven lays

     as the little lark whistled a sad farewell
     to the swiftly departing sun,
     and the last clear notes from the church's bell
     all faded away, one by one,
     I looked to the vault of the amber sky,
     and smiled and sighed the same
     as I sat by the edge of the balcony,
     by the side of the rushing Thames

   • The Alchemist

     Liquids green and gases blue,
     bubbling amidst eerie mists
     creeping vapors of every hue
     twisting, rising, turning anew
     trailing around, poisonous

     bottles; crooked, bent in shape,
     narrowing, widening until
     ending in open maws that gape;
     while their contents long to escape
     they long to be more filled

     this is the haunt of the alchemist,
     this is the heart of his lair
     pillars and shapes of noxious mist
     fill the interior of this,
     this pitiful cage of despair

     deep in the pit of his prison
     the alchemist lurks alone,
     sitting in silence, although within
     levers turn and gears spin
     and he can do naught but groan

     for the acme of his desire,
     the great Philosopher's stone
     cannot be found by earth and fire;
     his tries rise higher, ever higher
     but success lies dead as a bone

     so the alchemist lies and wonders
     upon the bleak road he has chose
     sitting amidst the mists, he flounders
     churning, his maniac mind ponders,
     as around him, the acid flows

     long ago, before he turned
     to the trade of metals cold,
     he lived simply; now he returns
     to the life he formerly spurned
     a life shining bright as gold

     no more now are metals cold,
     for he aches for a warm embrace;
     to free his mind of the maniac's hold,
     this is his longing; to enter the fold,
     and the love of the Maker's grace

   • The Chosin Few

     Like statues stand the sober trees,
     all clad in chastest white
     while frozen lie their symmetries
     against the stark black night;
     and falling snowflakes softly fleece
     the earth with chilling might

     unendingly the cold wind whines;
     the sky is mute and black
     the snowflakes fall upon the pines
     in hails of white-hued flak;
     while even treads engrave two lines
     upon the snowy track

     the crunch of boots upon the snow
     sends whispers through the pass
     with peering eyes the headlights glow
     beneath the tanks' low masts
     and forth the silent soldiers go,
     a group none may surpass

     metal upon metal sounds,
     of gun and hand grenade;
     each clink, jangle, thud resounds
     against uniforms frayed;
     the sounds of arms of war abound
     then slowly, softly fade

     for days the pass remains silent,
     and still lies every tree
     the wind blows on without relent,
     in bitter, cold degree
     pouring forth its sad lament
     for those it cannot see

     then softly, snow and trees awake
     as whispers sound again
     and awestruck breaths, all nature takes
     through barren plain and fen
     as sheets of crystal whiteness break
     beneath the steps of men

     the familiar notes again resound
     on snow and frozen mud,
     in silence ringing deep, profound,
     the men move in a flood;
     and gleaming dark upon the ground
     are trails and drops of blood

2. Tied for 2nd Place:
   • Austin Washburn

     Austin Washburn wrote the following three poems:

     • the rain starts slowly

       the rain starts slowly
       drip-drop, splish-splash
       and then it pours and everyone is caught, unable to find
       a dry inch

       I laugh and shake the water from my hair
       she shrieks as the cold fingers of the rain
       seize her
       the water falls from my beard onto my white shirt

       "It's gorgeous!" I scream
       She glares but can't hold her anger for long she marches over
       and kisses me
       my flannel shirt and her plastic jacket
       melt together in an autumn red puddle

       cars rush by in a stream, a river
       humming incessantly
       the sidewalk cowers under the hotel awning, unable to avoid the
       splish-splash
       slung carelessly from the street

       the corner,
       This corner,
       5th and West,
       Is deserted
       except for me and her and the overcast 4oclock sky

       the gray makes the day seem much older than it is
       and
       I could already feel a soft sleepiness easing in
       and
       she smiled again, her hair glued to her face

       we walked home, two blocks south
       fell asleep on the couch
       of our studio apartment
       with gray walls
       and our clothes drying in the sink

     • noir sur blanc

       I like stories about boxers and bank robbers;
       thugs, thieves, villains

       the unlucky ones pushed to the bounds

       fighting every minute for money or success or a cigarette or a
       girl

       maybe just to escape

       doubtless, it always ends the same:

       a fall from grace
       a blast of silence
       a rivulet of red

       and the Hero I admire
       is dead

       sometimes I wish my life was
       just like those Noir movies I adore;
       swift
       black
       grim

       with a jazz soundtrack and too much to drink and a femme fatale
       and a shootout,
       always a shootout.
       could it end any other way?

       running away is never strictly symbolic.

     • the first time I went to New York

       the rain on the window
       the jazz rushing out of
       the car stereo

       a crisp, vibrant city
       seen (with weary eyes)
       for the first time

       a tattered rag of a city
       seen (with eager eyes)
       for the first time

       I waltzed slowly across the state lines
       and drifted amongst the
       skyscrapers & lust
       of Madison & 5th
       and felt a sense of wonder
       at the history, and style,

       and the rain feel like usual
       and Coltrane played like usual
       and I couldn't help but continue driving
       slowly
       in traffic,

       trapped in awe

   • Jingwen Zhang

     Jingwen Zhang wrote the following three poems:

     • Poor Adrian

       Sharp of mind and fair of face
       Was the lad Adrian, unrivaled in grace
       In a world of penury, scarce better than a pauper,
       Much loved only by a farmer's daughter
       Yet Adrian had been cheerful and full of mirth
       Light of spirit since the moment of his birth.

       It was a spirit that visited at night
       A spirit, a demon, that gave him fright
       And whispered words in to his ear
       Words he needed not, yet craved to hear
       "Be but unhappy, say your will
       And that I'll be certain to fulfill."

       Unhappiness sat on his brown unfittingly
       Yet he thought a plan accordingly
       Unhappiness? Oh how strange the word sounded
       But in the end it was found through his beloved
       With a whip-like tongue he lashed out at her
       With his head wished for gemstones, many in number.

       The beloved, she left, beaten out of her wits
       His relations and kinsmen now bore his fits
       He shouted and slashed, tore them apart
       All to make heated anger rise in his heart
       Grief-stricken his closest family fell ill
       And he left with his riches, unrepentant still.

       With gold he built the finest dwellings
       Silver purchased a horde of hirelings
       Gems paid wine and fine meats on his plate
       As well as the throne from where he ruled all day
       But though he was assuredly the richest in the land
       The poor lad Adrian would never smile again.

     • Six in the Morning

       Six in the morning
       Till seven at night,
       Their tiny hands work
       With all their might.
       They're whipped and told,
       "No, that's not right,"
       Six in the morning
       Till seven at night.

       Six in the morning
       Till ten at night,
       They sneak away in quiet
       To drink or eat a bite.
       But here comes the tall man,
       His face angry and white,
       Six in the morning
       Till ten at night.

       Six in the morning,
       Up until midnight
       Their fingers know to weave,
       To labor, to tremble in fright.
       They dare not slack,
       Behind their work they'll hide,
       Six in the morning,
       Up until midnight.

       Six in the morning—
       But never back again
       They fall to hunger, exhaustion,
       All their lifeblood drained.
       No one noticed their absence
       For there was no curtain call—
       But did they truly pass on,
       Or had they lived at all?

     • Home

       This is my home in the lights,
       Lights of neon-lit shops, lights of tireless vehicles,
       Casting formless red and green halos into my room at midnight.
       Walking down the street after sunset,
       Under the lights of the hotels and hair salons,
       I'm caught in the headlights of countless taxis,
       Taxis flying by at the speed of light,
       Eager to find a struggling pedestrian, eager to find the next customer.

       This is my home in the noise,
       The beeping and honking of angry drivers,
       Drivers steering recklessly through the knot of dirty buses, shiny limos, and fragile bikes,
       All glazed over with a haze of murky rainbow gasoline.
       Before dawn I'm awakened, bleary-eyed and ever so sleepy,
       By the unwelcome cacophony of storekeepers,
       Storekeepers below, advertising their items in resonant shouts,
       And the sound of the city awakening to face the new dawn.

       This is my home in the sky,
       Where I open the window in my room on the twentieth floor to touch the clouds,
       Clouds like thin cotton candy floating just beyond my fingertips.
       Microscopic cars crawl, a multitude of shiny dots on a thread of gray and white.
       Neighboring high-rises stretch out their limbs, their antennae, and reach up,
       Up to transcend the atmosphere,
       To pass the pale, glowing, sickle-shaped moon,
       To touch the far-flung stars shimmering in the distance.

3. Amir Dada

   Amir Dada wrote the following three poems:

   • Spring

     I want to open the book of your face.

     Read pages that, as if dog-eared, fold and diminish—ebb and flow.

     When will I study the anatomy of your blushing cheeks?

     Winter has eaten them like strawberries, its seeds flying with the dry wind.

     Hair, your hair! When will it hatch more sand-colored snakes?

     There will be no blame for halting at your sight.

     I want the warm waves of your green seas—walled in by stony eyelashes.

     Your eyelids will crinkle at the rush.

     Your dry vines that assemble to your veined temple.

     I want that blue canal to carry life gently through.

     I want you to let me push back the ten, bare horizons.

     And watch the late sunrises on your nails.

     I want to see your spine—hills of stone lead a road to the meadow of your neck.

     I wonder how many have journeyed through.

     So when is the orientation of the rest of your body?
     When will you free the urgent hawk that pounds in your ribcage?

     I will help; yell—release its needy shrills;
     wait for the lasting wisps to become invisible;
     then, propel its wings north.
     Then, the blossoming of your legs and other landscapes.

   • A Tour Guide Explains Concrete Corn

     This right here is the result of when Dublin, Ohio used tax money
     to formulate a hybrid of corn and concrete.
     When the ears grew to people size,
     they had testers peel the leaves of all 109 and feast,
     but the concrete made it too hard to eat
     (which brings up the probable suing of testers for tooth damage;
     there's no record, but I have my suspicions).
     Anyway, the corn was left for art.
     And so since art calls for interpretation
     and since my ancestors never got a share of the harvest,
     I walk this field and make something of it.
     I pass corn ears and wonder if they
     listen to the decaying ground below.
     Were the green leaves really our green flags
     that testers pulled down from the cob flagpoles?
     I walk around and wonder why the kernels are so people-sized,
     so camouflaged behind the white of passerby.
     I wonder why they are opaque like rows of mirrors standing in uniform.

   • An Orphan Finds an iPod Touch

     The orphan cups its metal back
     With beggar palms scared her hands will veer too much

     (A hunk of her employer's cash shredding on the kitchen tile)

     Her thumbs meander on marble messages
     She can barely read but she knows royal floors
     Better than she knows mulch
     She even knows how many scrubs it takes to get a bonus

     She stretches her index finger to continue toying with it

     Her hands are rusty pennies

     Afghan music finds her and she clenches her fists in excitement

     Her knuckles are lavish diamonds

     She presses play
     Tablas and accordions flood her body like the river water she once bathed in
     Her feet begin to take quick steps, shoulders bounce, hands rattle it
     Dance engulfs her
     Her thrift-wear spins to silk, her wrists grow heavy with gold
     Scrolls of her green dress bloom to petals properly
     She is back home, no longer a maid—

     Then the oven beeps and the family's dinner is ready
     She blushes, cuts the music,
     And watches its screen become black glass
     The orphan puts it on the breakfast table

     As if serving a plate of food

Adults

1. Nicole Gnezda

   Nicole Gnezda wrote the following three poems:

   • Solo Sweet Potato on the Counter

     Accustomed to death but unable to trash
     a wrinkled up grandmother yam, last Spring
     I, pall bearer, elbows against my sides, carried her
     to a dirty place between tomato sprouts and zinnia starts,
     an extra spot not used to growing.
     The yam lay there to rest.

     A traveling circus, the harvest moon performed
     last week then snuck away. Big Boys waste on earth
     while bony Icabods cast shadow lines
     cross frosted lawns. Headless
     stalks stand guard, perennially vacant
     as once they were opulent.

     In knitted wool, spade under foot, I
     rob a grave, look for treasure, curious about rot.
     Penetrate. Leverage. Turn soil over. Unearth
     buried extensions of stems relieved of leafing.
     Arthritic fingers poke up
     from the netherworld. Halloween underground.

     Yams of sorts, an effort at least.
     More fingers, toes, a fist ready
     for the big punch. Another hide-out
     another punch. More and more and more.
     Eighteen Yams! various as the human world
     hard and strong as hope.

   • Secretly Beyond

     One filament invisible
     but for a recalcitrant ray, reflection
     seen only from precise place, acute angle
     glint of a line in the air. What spider

     wove her life from garnet leaved Japanese Maple
     to brown ground in Ohio, up up
     and away to a crabapple's blush blossoms
     and across the sky?

     Her great web canopies my living space
     east to west, dirt to heaven, secretly beyond
     the spectrum of eyes, the boundaries
     of comprehension

     but for an improbable
     glimpse from an accidental
     twist of the head and a speck
     of light from the sun.

   • Potential of Flying

     The potential of a kite was too painful
     for me to enjoy the flying
     despite rich flashes
     of red or orange, slashes
     of rises and dives, ardent
     striving toward heights.
     The potential of my grip
     on string was tenuous, vulnerable
     to unexpected lurch
     when the kite would free itself to sky
     shrink in color, in quantity, to absence.
     I could speculate about a lost kite
     showing up, a place I could not name,
     visit, nor even fathom, still
     radiant with color, picked up by a child full
     of vigor, to fly again.
     Or suspended in branches
     close to the shimmer of sun,
     tail in grace with the air.

     Grown up when my son was born,
     I forgot the potential of a kite.

2. Nolan Rindfleisch

   Nolan Rindfleisch wrote the following three poems:

   • First Snow

     Double Doppler Ten warnings;
     threats of storms, weather systems
     from the Gulf and Canada will
     clash near Cincinnati tonight.
     Squalls of thick flakes,
     the fireplace a cave
     of whistling wind,
     tangled tines of maples,
     sycamores in the bright night.

     My wife sweeps clear the branches
     of the junipers, feeds the birds
     sunflower seeds and millet;
     juncos, sparrows apprehensive
     swarm behind the rowdy jays and
     raucous crows; in every house
     in sight, families retreat
     to puzzles, songs and games,
     hot drinks, gas logs aflame.

     I feel again the bitter joy
     of melting snow invading
     wrists, unshielded neck,
     burning cheeks now tight with cold,
     of teasing rough touch dalliance
     with girls on hills of snow;
     my happy terror on the steep
     toboggan chute, a swift ballistic trip
     along a rugged mile long route.

     White manna of the soul, your cliffs of drifts,
     the fluttering rush of angels' wings, the
     children rolling hand-packed balls of thawing snow
     into larger globes of zeal, the crusty crunch
     of sleds that dash across the prickliness
     of frozen slush, those romps of girls and boys
     together in their thrill of wintry play
     astonish still. Now, all these sports seem fashioned
     by the risky bliss of sparkling ice on skin.

   • Dawn Moon

     The moon guides the rhythm of the tides.......Held with such nobility in the dome of the night, it offers an ever-ebbing journey of light. John O'Donohue, 2004

     We embrace in the obscurity of 4AM,
     too soon awake for ordinary usefulness,

     my restless wife and I. She whispers,
     "How I love to have you look up at

     this autumn moon with me!
     What if there were no moons

     bright in the morning West?" I reply,
     "We'd have to fancy lovers in the shrouding

     mist of moon-less skies with no more tides
     to yield along wide swaths of shore,

     the residue of aeons, calcite coated shells,
     algae, stranded fish and sand locked snails;

     no more romantic swoons, or honeymoons;
     nor times when babies's sea-like reservoirs

     will break; nor 'loonies' crying out from Bedlams
     their moonstruck sermons through the night;

     no more phantom lunar man to startle
     dogs and little boys; nor astronauts

     who dwell in awe upon their haunting
     by the moon's exquisite desolating joys;

     no more ghostly glow of 'borrowed'
     light brushing wintry seas of snow;

     nor northern lakes, their shadowed edges
     hedged by blackened boughs of pine;

     and no more knightly trysts like these
     in the chalky dark of time."

   • Along Alzheimer's road

     "...the poor old house is a house with a broken heart"
     The House with Nobody In It. Joyce Kilmer

     Posted on the sunlit face of this barn red shed,
     an opening of heedless glass; within cling flakes
     of desiccate cicada; webs encrust the panes,
     emboss dry insects' fluttering to death. I stare

     into this shade of mute oblivion, a dusty fuzz
     of absence; then glimpse a slight light stream
     as if of someone's dimming inner space,
     a plaintive sign there is no time to waste.

     I long to learn about the lost accounts of all
     those once alive who used to dwell nearby,
     stout cohorts of the kids who fed the hogs
     and milked the cows. With their leaving house

     and shed, dusky silence speaks its woeful piece—
     a house with nobody in it—in my memory
     a fellow nicknamed "Red", one time farm boy,
     long time friend, whose body struggled into Rest,

     his ashes flecked with weary tears; his head—
     a house with nobody in it for years.

3. Olivia Varney

   Olivia Varney wrote the following two poems:

   • Night Swans

     They came upon the wind like sailing ships
     Cutting through the darkness like a sudden cry,
     Luminous as clouds against the cobalt sky,
     With broad, beating wings and blackened lips,
     And soundlessly they settled on the glassy lake,
     Dipping and dropping with a whisper's grace,
     Ghostly dancers gliding on the water's face,
     Silken ripples trailing shadows in their wake.

   • Albion

     With shaking legs we settled on this earth.
     We learned to prosper in these new-found lands.
     We forged a nation from the toil of our hands
     And forgot the cradle-country of our birth.

     But in sleep we dream of white cliffs and a white horse
     And misty dawns amidst the standing stones.
     The pull of ancient blood and ancient thrones
     Pricks our sleeping eyes with wet remorse.

     For far across the ocean we were born
     On that windswept isle beneath the sea-gray sky,
     And once we roamed the emerald plains that lie
     In the land of the lion and the unicorn.

     But long ago we left that distant shore,
     And like a restless youth or straying spouse,
     We turned and sailed from fair Alfred's house
     And left behind the days and dreams of yore.

     This great divorce has cost us many things;
     Our childhood haunts and gilded halls,
     A country where the quilted soil still recalls
     The footsteps of a hundred thousand kings.

     O Albion, where first we were begotten,
     Speak to us of when the world was young.
     Tell us of the great deeds done and old songs sung,
     Remind us now of all the things we have forgotten.