May 2018 Winners - Spring Poems

Photo by Wilda Morris, taken at The Clearing, Ellison Bay, Wisconsin

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This month, I asked both William Marr and Alan Harris, authors of example poems posted with the challenge, to judge the submissions separately. Each picked a different first place poem. Here are the two winners:

Long ago

One afternoon in early spring

we walked this road as shadows

deepened in surrounding woods.

Mourning Doves in the distance

called out their tender message,

robins had returned.

Bird song accompanied our steps

as they constructed their nests.

A cloud passed over 

and there was a moment of silence

as you pulled out loose tufts

of your thick, dark hair,

tucked them under the rough bark

of your favorite oak tree.

This was before the chemo failed,

before you called out

as breath left your body,

before missing you began.

You were the friend

I wanted to grow old with,

share memories 

on days like this.

As I walk this road today, 

again, I hear mourning doves,

a madrigal of robins,

chickadees, sparrows.

I pass your favorite tree

and think of how the nests

are made stronger with your hair.

~Doris Bezio

William Marr commented, “The vivid memory of a long-ago early spring afternoon reinforces the poetic feeling of emptiness and sadness when "you" are missing from the scene of this spring day, except for some loose tufts of hair.” 

Here is the poem that tied for first place:

From Kites and Spring, Memories Rise

Two or three parts assembled easily,

mostly light, mostly right.

That's enough to stoke

a memory for me,

this one-- of kites in Spring:

balsa wood spines

strung with diamond masts,

twined knots thin

enough to snare a fish

whorled tight

around small hands.

There two or three of us,

scruffy, out-of-school-uniform

kids in weekend clothes.

Spring, 

season of unbuttoned jackets, which

might spin into wings.

It would be a while before any of

us would fly, and so we flew kites.

Outside, where spring's indifferent

skies were unfolded canvases for

an art that couldn't stand still.

We'd watch each other,

every launch a prelude before

the risky climb, the power lines,

then the slow waltz into the rooftops'

empty spaces, kingdoms where chimneys

and nighthawks ruled. Always,

we felt twine notch wrinkle thin

ribbons in our palms. Always we

kept control panels in hand,

let our kites dance with

whatever defied the ground.

Until suddenly they were downed.

Spun into scraps,

divvyed up by wind among

Spring's prong-like trees,

bushes bereft of blossoms,

or onto fire escape landing shelves.

We were left with scraps, and it's

the scraps that are  in each of us

memory bits that you

must assemble yourself.

~ Sheila Elliott

Alan Harris said, “The poem “From Kites and Spring, Memories Rise” is alive with original and vivid imagery.” As examples, he mentioned, “We felt twine notch wrinkle thin/ribbons in our palms,” and "kingdoms where chimneys and nighthawks ruled.”

Second place goes to a haiku (as is traditional, this haiku has no title):

stark naked branches

reach out, waiting to be clothed

in flecks of spring green

~ Marjorie Pagel

Third place winner is another free verse poem:

Assurances of Spring

When March appears on the calendar,

I check the feeder on my pine tree

for signs of returning robins.

Ibis descend on our greening lawn

their long, curved bills aerating

the packed ground

in search of emerging insects.

Crocus, azalea, iris, forsythia

pop up along lawn’s fringes

punctuating gray, rainy

April days with flashes of fuchsia

purple, yellow, white.

But it’s only when I can put asparagus,

tender peas, greens, ramps,

and strawberries on our dinner

table that I am assured spring

is truly here.

For I have eaten of its glory.

~ Joan Leotta

This month, due to having two judges, we also have a fourth place Poem:

Spring Blue

In the heart of the nation

no ocean

so I carve time to indulge

in the widest blue I know:

bluebells blooming

in the woods,

only for a short time

since branches above

show tiny yellow-green

petals-of-leaves

which in this overdue

warmth will enlarge quickly

masking sunlight feeding

this sea of blue,

stealing my ocean,

leaving me once again

on dry land. 

~ Marilyn Peretti

Spring Blue was posted on LinkedIn.com, April, 2018.

Congratulations to each of the winning poets! The winning poets retain copyright on their own poems.

Bios:

Doris Bezio is a poet/experimental artist, who has a lifelong love affair with books and learning. She has attended writers’ conferences at Wheaton College, Illinois Wesleyan as well as classes at UW-Fox Valley UW-Oshkosh with Ellen Kort, Laurel Mills and others and her poetry has been featured in calendars and other publications.

Sheila Elliott is a poet, writer and active participant in many Chicago area literary organizations including Poets and Patrons.

Alan Harris retired from a 22-year career with Commonwealth Edison, in which he had served as a computer programmer, systems analyst, computer trainer, and Web developer. Between 1982 and 1995 he privately print-published ten books of poems and aphorisms for friends and family. These books and all subsequent poetry collections are now on the Web at Noon Out of Nowhere - Collected Poems. His books in PDF format are downloadable at PDF Books. Alan is a past president of the Illinois State Poetry Society and currently maintains the ISPS Web site while residing in Tucson, Arizona.

Joan Leotta is a writer, journalist, author, essayist, and story performer whose stories and poems often deal with food. You can download a mini-chapbook of her poems at

https://www.origamipoems.com/files/Books%20/2016/Joan_Leotta_-_Dancing_Under_The_Moon_2016R.pdf and learn more about her work at

www.joanleotta.wordpress.com and on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Joan-Leotta-Author-and-Story-Performer/188479350973.

William Marr has published 23 volumes of poetry (two in English and the rest in his native Chinese language), 3 books of essays, and several books of translations. Chicago Serenade is a trilingual (Chinese/English/French) anthology of his poems published in Paris in 2015. Some of his poems are used in high school and college textbooks in Taiwan, China, England, and Germany. 

Marjorie Pagel has been impatiently waiting for spring to arrive in Franklin, Wisconsin. She is the author of The Romance of Anna Smith and Other Stories, available on Amazon.

Marilyn Peretti, of Chicago suburbs, grew up in Indianapolis, and loved the woods of Brown County where her father was born. Now she immerses herself in woods of Morton Arboretum, seeking varied fungus on logs, focusing on them for watercolors. She exhibits at Morton with the Nature Artists Guild. Recipient of a Pushcart nomination, she is published in Kyoto Journal, Grey Sparrow, Journal of Modern Poetry, Talking River, New Verse News, California Quarterly, Snowy Egret, and others.

© Wilda Morris

April Poetry Challenge Winners

The April Challenge was to write a poem about poetry or about writing poetry. After I narrowed down the submissions to three finalists, I couldn’t decide which one was the winner. Last week I attended a writers conference. Still uncertain which poem to select, I consulted three other writers whose critiques had impressed me. They did not all agree, so I have decided to declare three winners. I hope you enjoy these three winning poems.

Journal

I was one of his lesser experiments

…given the consideration of crumbs.

He delighted in degradation,

his words, twisting with the wind,

…kept pushing the hurt deeper.

So I walked out into the night,

invisible to his eyes.

The stars came out of the darkness

…and sprinkled sorrow.

I climbed over mountains of doubt,

waded through rivers of grief,

explored the depths of my conscience,

…searching for my self.

The long, arduous journey brought me here

and now. So I write        because

words I cannot bring to my mouth

…sometimes come to my pen.

~ Eileen Kimbrough

Poetry

....is a pulse, unseen, that guides us

Past the corners and the slick-faced

Surfaces of so many things:

Poetry?  It's a beautiful

Side-long glance ending in ripples

Wrapped around a tree felled in an

Unexpected storm years ago.

Some things poetry can't let go,

Meter, say, and that beat that makes

You think of the hail that pulsed on

Eaves of the Quick Mart four summers

Past. Poetry keeps the rhythm

Of what you can't let go, it rises

Like sweat from a gentle heat

We barely feel. There, poetry

Is found, often enough, at least,

To keep a poet looking around.

~ Sheila Elliott

About Your Poems

Don't make me climb
a rickety ladder
to the attic to dig
through that old trunk
where you've hidden
your joy and pain.
Don't make me work
to understand you.
Slice the top off my head.
Pour your molten wisdom
into my mind.
Expose me to whistling hate,
force my mouth open
to taste the brittle finality of death.
Wrap the string of earth's cruelty
around my eyes.
Sing to me of snow caverns
and ancient cellos.
Talk of all the lost loves
who walk your dreams.
Hold my hand
and tell it true.

~ Peggy Trojan

These poets own copyright on their poems. Please do not distribute copies without permission.

Bios:

Eileen Kimbrough is a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has produced visual arts in many media and exhibited in art galleries, museums, colleges, and gift shops throughout Illinois. She has been employed as a graphic designer, editorial and fashion illustrator, receptionist, bookkeeper and salesperson.  Eileen has sold many copies of her self-published poetry book, Painting with Words, and contributed the poems and art for Wings for the Soul, published by a non-profit. Her stories and poems were published in Rivulets. She lives in Aurora with her husband, Bob Walker, innumerable books and artistic clutter.

Sheila Elliott is a poet who is an active participant in the workshops, public readings and print publication of the Oak Park Writers Group. A self-published chap book, Autumn Light, was completed in 2015.

Peggy Trojan lives happily in the north woods of Wisconsin where she gardens, writes, and entertains.  Author of two chapbooks, Everyday Love, and HOMEFRONT, Childhood Memories of WWII, and a full collection, Essence.

The May Poetry Challenge will be posted soon.

 

©  Wilda Morris