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Grab a bowl of popcorn and join us at the movies! The July challenge called for poems about movies, or poems that alluded to or referenced movies.
Judge Cindy Guentherman said judging was hard because there were a lot of interesting poems submitted. She added, “I will admit I have not seen most of these movies, but a poem needs to stand on its own anyway.”
Guentherman selected “The Quiet Beauty of Home Alone 2” for fourth place.
The Quiet Beauty of Home Alone 2
Watching
Home Alone 2 at the cinema
with
my classmates turned me
into
a heron from Central Park.
I
watched pigeon-grey skyscrapers
nestle
Kevin with their wing-like shadows
as
he outwitted Harry and Marv,
the
two thieves thicker than concrete.
I
felt Kevin's anxiety cooler than
the
winter air and wanted to absorb
it
in the crook of my neck. I wanted
him
to be still like a haiku so he could see
New
York in slow motion and be at peace -
like
my tranquility in the nest of my seat
while
the voices of my classmates
were
Koi carp and the cinema
a
lily pad floating on a lake
as
moonlight fell like winter blossoms.
~ Christian Ward
Guentherman commented, “This poem itself is a quiet beauty, with cool details and metaphors. And I too am a sucker for haiku.”
Third place went to “November 4, 1995.”
November 4, 1995
Watching
Pulp Fiction on Israeli TV,
the
camp-like kibbutz fast asleep.
Lexi
complaining of bugs in
the bed
we shared.
She
couldn't sleep, later I would think
it was
as if she knew.
The
movie was interrupted by a phone call.
I
refused to answer it,
even
though I was the only one awake.
After
all, it wasn't my house.
Ring
after ring after ring
finally
someone picked it up.
Lexi
trampled out,
itchy
and groggy, banged on
their
door. It was their daughter,
calling
from the other end
of the
kibbutz.
She had
received a call from Tel Aviv.
"Somebody's
been shot
at the
peace rally," was the news.
Five
minutes later, she called back.
"Rabin's
been shot at the rally."
Lexi
and I could barely react.
I
watched as Pulp Fiction
turned
into its own worst
reality. The newsbreak was
more
confused than I was.
At
least Lexi could swear and
I could
let my shock consume me.
The
next day we returned to Jerusalem
like
nothing had happened,
trying
not to think about the body
of the
prime minister
on its
way to the same place.
We were
as solemn as the soldiers
in the
strangely empty bus.
~ Eve Lyons
This poem was published in the now defunct journal Fireweed in August of 1999. Subsequently included in my book, Tikkun Olam: Repairing the World, published by WordTech Communications in June of 2020.
“I was right with the author from beginning to end,” says Guentherman. “It goes from the itchiness of bedbugs to someone being killed, and that is how life really is, isn't it?” She liked the way the author related her own reality to the movie.
For second place, Guentherman selected a poem about a French film, Un Homme et Une Femme, which the poet says was poorly dubbed in English. Nevertheless, the poem suggests that he found the movie moving.
Un Homme et Une Femme
They
were on the fishing boat’s fantail,
and
he was having difficulty
lighting
his cigarette in the sea breeze.
Remember the scene?
She
opened her coat for him
and
he quickly leaned in,
using
it to block the wind.
Is that when they started to fall in love?
Except,
I don’t know if we start to love,
or
if it’s just there in the heartbeat needed
to
open two selves, to guard the flame together.
~ Lennart Lundh
“Un Homme et Une Femme” first appeared in Poems Against Cancer 2014 (self-published).
Guentherman’s comments: “When I first got all the poems, I skimmed them all that night and this one was still with me in the morning. I love the whole idea of her opening her coat to block the wind so he can light his cigarette. The poem wonders when love begins, and I think this act of simple kindness is a good start. And I have never even smoked!”
The first-place poem is by a previous winner:
The
Struggle for Humanness
After watching ‘The Art of Racing in the Rain’ by Garth Stein
The
moon wheeled through tar black skies
in a
movie about a big old dog driving in
the
driving rain with his owner, or rather a man
he
owned and loved. I knew his barks, his sighs.
I
heard his thoughts about humanity, his scratching
at
the TV to understand the ironies in politics. He saw
that
some would rather kick a dog. Yet still, I’m awed—
his
wishing to be reborn as human. I laughed, then catching
my
breath, I wept as rains poured on oil-slick turns.
Many
races determined there, and many lives as such
have
changed. There’s always a measure of pain, how much
depends
on time spent in the pit, whether the tires churn
with
the right amount of tread, as well as endurance, the feel
of the road, and if the stars line
up over the steering wheel.
~ John C. Mannone
This poem was previously published in an anthology, Moving Images: Poems Inspired by Film (ed. Jennifer Maloney & Bart White, Before Your Quiet Eyes Publishing, 2021).
Of “The Struggle for Humanness,” Guentherman says, “It has skillful rhyme and half rhyme and the whole poem is a metaphor. My favorite line is ‘if the stars line up over the steering wheel.’”
A big round of applause to the winners! And a big “thank you” to Cindy Guentherman for judging, and to all the poets who entered the July Poetry Challenge. Check back on August 1 for a new challenge. YOU might win next month!
Bios:
Cindy Guentherman has been writing poetry since she was in kindergarten. She has two books of poetry and is on the board of the Rockford Writers' Guild.
Lennart Lundh is a poet, photographer, short-fictionist, and historian. His work has appeared internationally since 1965.
Eve Lyons is a poet and fiction writer living in the Boston area. Her work has appeared in Lilith, Literary Mama, Hip Mama, PIF, Welter, Prospectus, Poetry Quarterly, Barbaric Yawp, Word Riot, Dead Mule of Southern Literature, as well as other magazines and several anthologies. Her first book of poetry, Tikkun Olam: Repairing the World, was published in May of 2020 by WordTech Communications. She works as an expressive arts therapist at an outpatient mental health clinic and teaches at Lesley University.
John C. Mannone has poems appearing in Windhover, North Dakota Quarterly, Foreign Literary Journal, Le Menteur, Blue Fifth Review, Poetry South, Baltimore Review, and others. He won the Grace Writers Excellence in Poetry Award (2021), Impressions of Appalachia Creative Arts Contest in poetry (2020), the Carol Oen Memorial Fiction Prize (2020), and the Joy Margrave Award (2015, 2017) for creative nonfiction. He was awarded a Jean Ritchie Fellowship (2017) in Appalachian literature and served as the celebrity judge for the National Federation of State Poetry Societies (2018). His forthcoming (2021) collections are Flux Lines: The Intersection of Science, Love, and Poetry (Linnet’s Wings Press) and Sacred Flute (Iris Press) He edits poetry for Abyss & Apex and other journals. A retired physics professor, John lives in Knoxville, Tennessee. http://jcmannone.wordpress.com. https://www.facebook.com/jcmannone/.
Christian Ward is a UK based writer who can be currently found in Wild Greens, Literary Yard, Grand Little Things and The Pangolin Review.
© Wilda Morris
