easterday poetry award winner 2015-2016

"BEST of ISSUE"

FALL 2015-2016

Reflection

Myriads of furious lightning bolts freely marry

Lovely waters of the storming sea,

The wedding and desire of waves and fire

A union far less fleeting

Than that of you and me

And that burden shall I carry.

Hellish hoarfrost hovers on heart and window

I wait patiently for you at the sill,

Enthusiastic and bent on your advent

When you were to come over the hill

While I watched for spring as well

Even if I only saw the snow.

But frost does melt and streams are quick’ning

And at the close of each day

I softly sigh and gently cry,

You’re not on your way,

Because you could no longer stay.

Oh, winter in my heart! and outside spring.

S. Ana Henriquez, TX, The Atonement Academy

EDITOR’S CHOICE SELECTION

Sonnet for the Solemn

The winding road before us spits black bile,

Fills wintry footprints, marking our Descent

In voidlike hue, a bleeding Chelsea smile

For chronicling the wanderings of the Spent

Small Alice bravely fell into a hole

The Universe arranged in Black and White

Before her eyes, and rent her childlike soul

With covenants of “Possibly” and “Might”

O Abel, turn the lights off, time to sleep!

The sole reprieve permitted Solemn Man

Sweet Alice shut her eyes to take the Leap

To Fall is so much simpler than to Stand

O Spent, O Solemn, Dance! that you might See!

Unburdened is the only way to Be.

Ryan Farrell, NY, Bishop Kearney

ALL OTHER "CERTIFIED" NATIONAL WINNERS

Girl - Michelle Chen, NY, Hunter College High School

Doubt Under Duress - Devina Boughton, OR, Franklin High School

Yesterday's Ashes - Hannah Gritter, MI, Holland Christian High School

Nuncle's Dirge, or what the feau wrote the blade - Tess Drauscak, PA, The Hill School

My Death Occurred in Front of the Classroom - Julia Dobel, NJ, David Brearly High School

Hibernation - Kaitlin Scherzinger, IN, Hamilton Southeastern HS

Shutter Click - Jenna Liu, MO, Rock Bridge High School

Wooden Chamber - Justin Yu, AZ, Hamilton High School

Solid Like Lead - Elizabeth Mason, FL, Steinbrenner High School

Passe - Rosemary Ajegwu, MD, Bowie High School

Remedy - Katherine Van Kirk, VA, Jefferson HS Science & Technology

Luna - Melissa Padron, NC, homeschooled

When Silence Speaks Ill of Me - Veronica Gurnawan, MA, Westborough

May - Ella Fishman, MD, Walt Whitman High School

I Have Something to Say - Sangwoo (Mike) Yim, CA, Santa Margarita Catholic High School

The Atelier - Grace Villaroman, CA, Oxford Academy


JUST POETRY!!! & the Live Poets Society of NJ...

legitimately good poetry since 1998

no fooling, no kidding, no scamming.

"BEST of ISSUE"

WINTER 2015-2016

Moirai

Gray slush, squelching, a wet echo in the sullen woods

All sparkling whiteness gone, trodden dense

And there – I stop – there, crumpled, a frosted form.

Red, red, deep and crusting, bringing crows like wheeling cinders.

Milky eyes watch dully and my shriek scatters feathers

Those familiar cheekbones, that long nose – those hands – shattered-glass-thudding fists.

Scars in the ice where scrabbling fingers left troughs – a murder, obviously.

Beaten dogs bite – and I – phantom blacks and blues – wouldn't I? Oh, wouldn't I?

No one – for miles – except myself, and the crows – intruder, they cry! – and the carcass.

Sightless eyes gaze asunder, loose jaw laughs – laughs! – feeding off panic, as usual –

Strange, the stillness… blind sky above, rutted path below, stiff invader by the wayside.

Report – I should – and yet. A fitting sentence, this. Not fair, but neither was my own…

Soft evening light, the ultimate equalizer. Leaves, limbs, laws, jumbled in gray unison.

How long until decay reclaims the vile creature? Now half-assimilated, icy & beak-torn.

Flesh to feed scavengers, death into life, and come spring the maggots will feast.

Surely nature is as good a judge as any. If I walked, kept my silence, leveled scales…

Gray sleet, hissing, a wet murmur in the sullen woods

Bitter rain sluicing over bloated skin, crusted blood melting away into rust-streaks.

Drops send shivers down my crown, but home, I know, will be warm. Turn, walk on.

Tug gloves, flick hood, burrow hands in toasty pockets – I've dinner to make, after all.

Gwen Roberts, CO, Vista Ridge High School

EDITOR'S CHOICE WINNER

Oblivion

Every night, I pull open the thin layer of glass, blurring the lines of within and without

Every night, I crack open the blinds, like sleepy Sunday morning eyes

Maybe I'm afraid that the snug blankets will stifle my dreams

If I don't offer some way of escape,

The empty spaces between my mattress will absorb me

Into a place entangled with the sorrow of memory.

Or maybe I like the window open because when I look up,

Millions of tiny particles of light and freckles off the face of the moon glare back at me

Because the evening air intoxicates me,

And the breeze explores the fissures of my figure with a sense of endearment

Because the limitless universe of astronomical proportions is somewhat consoling,

Like a nursery rhyme is hidden within the nebulae and suspended between the meteors.

But there is truth and there is invention.

The universe is both.

When I am almost asleep yet not quite awake,

A lump builds in my throat

Because the universe is too big

And I am already absorbed Into the breathing space of humanity

Into the empty place between the stars.

Voulette Hattar, CA, Valencia High School

ALL OTHER CERTIFIED NATIONAL WINNERS

Air - Harika Kottakota, CA, Burbank High School

Clearwater - Anli Chen, FL, Dr. Phillips High School

Lavender Demise - Courtney Lefevers, TX, Odessa High School

A Longing Unfulfilled - Christina Chong, NJ, Bergen County Academies

Coast Highway - Bowen Jiang, CA, Pleasant Valley High School

Oh Vonnegut soul searcher... - Abigail Rose Munson, CO, Compass Montessori High School

Skate - Ariel Wiegand, NH, Merrimack High School

For A Penny - Allison Huang, NJ, The Lawrenceville School

The Second Law - Anna Savelyeva, TX, Liberal Arts/Science Academy

LAMENT - Keairra Abdul-Ahad, TX, Claudia Taylor Johnson HS

Division, Soft - Ava Goga, NV, Robert McQueen High School

Let the Voices Die - S. Ana Henriquez, TX, The Atonement Academy

All the dead Flowers Since 2001 - Laura Elizabeth Wendt, WA, International Community School

He called me the poet, - Casey Hennings, IN, Kankakee Valley HS

from the mouths of babes come unhappy liars - Lauren Edwins, WA, Washington Virtual Academy

The Speck We Know as Humanity - India Persson, NC, Charlotte Latin

Mosaic - Eva Cranch, OR, Lake Oswego High School

Sonnet 18 - Part Two - Shyla Davis, MA, Haverhill High School

JUST POETRY!!! & the Live Poets Society of NJ...

legitimately good poetry since 1998

no fooling, no kidding, no scamming.

"BEST of ISSUE" WINNER

SPRING 2015-2016

Reasons

her name tumbles out of me like clear water over river rocks

and how could anyone meet this love with sin behind their teeth?

with a tongue that still meets mine despite contagion, a tongue

that nicks collarbones with gentle breath, a tongue that whittles love

into a boomerang that keeps ®evolving back around, she pulls the calmness out of me and lays it to bask in a patch of sun, slows my pulse to reptilian rates but when we are all mania, all heartbeat all t(h)rust all hitched skirts hitched breath hitched period, my bones relax

into her the way an old house settles into its foundation–

there’s a reason our ghosts play so well together. there’s

a reason she fortresses my swollen self in a moat of her arms, a

reason our futures found themselves holding hands. sharing a bed.

a reason we knock teeth and giggle, make noises at noises, share

cocktails of morning breath and nightmare-aftermath and the

tangled clunking of pre-dawn limbs. a reason we gravitate. a reason

our body parts fit like russian nesting dolls, our thoughts like

they consulted each other before meeting air or ear, a reason our diseases complement each other’s antibodies. there’s a million reasons

for this love and this love is all of them, but out of all million reasons,

I can’t find one why this could be wrong.

Mallie Holcomb, NC, Cary High School

EDITOR’S CHOICE SELECTION

SPRING 2015-2016

raw Melange

Mother bathes four cups of rice in a

stream of cold water, a pale crescent that

rises dully from the sediment montage, and

filters them through a metal chain to save them

for a face facade. The piano keys are burning a

white curtain, a stippled effect of the fortnight’s

medieval musings, and they shrivel like an overcooked

and dried lychee, to about somewhere in between

a half and a full serving. She breathes quietly and

her slow uncooked breaths outline the still-maiden

circle of her hips that nestle the tepid crook of early evening.

Misled rice grains slide down dish piles, the cracking

spaces of it – stains that skinny down to

the rubber grooves in unused blue washer gloves.

Later, she saunters to the hollow of her room,

her footsteps like dead sandpaper in quiet,

the acrid taste of unbroken slaver. And we appear

in blurry outlines, the filling in worn old sandals,

to slip paper skins into her hands,

a daily memento of a night’s mantilla.

Alisha Yi, NV, Ed W Clark High School

ALL OTHER CERTIFIED NATIONAL WINNERS

Storyteller - Flor Sanchez, CA, Patterson High School

Upstairs and Straight Back - Lauren Peller, NY, Half Hollow Hills East

Grand Canyon - Parisa Thepmankorn, NJ, Morris Hills High School

Today I Tore Apart the Coloring Book - Lina Zhang, MO, Marquette Panacea - Kyle Carlee, NJ, St. Peter's Prep

England Gets A Walking Man - Taylor Bellah, TX, Canyon High School

To the New World - Anshula Varma, TX, Centennial High School

Sonnet for Andy Warhol's Suicide (Fallen Body) - Kana Turley, DE, Tall Oaks Classical School

To the Virginia Enlisted Man's Frock Coat from the Civil War - Katy Kim, NJ, Newark Academy

Fire Escape - Mary Binzley, WI, Monona Grove High School

we were girls - Talia Flores, MN, Eden Prairie High School

No More - Ashton Yeatts, TX, Timber Creek High School

Enshrined Demise - Grace Xu, GA, Parkview High School

Eyes Wait Upon the Sky - Kia Addison, WA, Spanaway Lake HS

Lily - Laraine Cheung, NY, Townsend Harris High School

The Crow - Luke Taylor, NJ, Bergen County Academies

Pillow Fort - Canzada Friday, NC, NC School Science and Mathematics

I love - Michelle Kim, NY, Edgemont Jr./Sr. High School

Part of Your damn World - Cynthia Liu, MD, Montgomery Blair HS

Handling the Truth - Hailey Verelst, MA, Monson High School

JUST POETRY!!! & the Live Poets Society of NJ...

legitimately good poetry since 1998

no fooling, no kidding, no scamming.

"BEST of ISSUE" WINNER

SUMMER 2015-2016

Stencils

Fog on the mountains makes stencils out of trees,

while crows make stencils out of me.

Ninety years, nine rusted chairs they sewed me into.

Years after birds became bees and top shelves olympus,

I’ll be a willow, the wisp in velvet.

I’m sunk into the bottom of the bog I used to

coax fish out of when it was deeper and I, shallow.

When paths were paths and earth, dirt.

Now I tunnel tents and time tempests

with the shaking of my bones.

The mountains I once owned, own me, with a grip

of iron and coal sucked up in my car engine.

Ten mile radius with a feathered frontal lobe

and fettered soles and souls. Reliance,

on the crosshatch windows at night.

I am on that mountain, above, and below,

pressed between pages and not yet picked by little hands.

Pickled, and not yet planted, like the stories set

in no-man’s land. I am paper thin and running

to outrun the ten-foot man.

Emma Beitzel, VA, John Handley High School

EDITOR'S CHOICE AWARD

SUMMER 2015 - 2016

Alucinari

My fingers hook the blue acai through the fretted skin of my mouth

as my father, he rose from two fish scales spiraling about,

tells me that I will not speak to the sane man steering a ferry, that

I cannot, on the contrary.

My mother cringes, she lives by amaranth,

bleeding water on his spoons.

I’ve seen eyes so red when the rivers stitch her a velvet sea. His

night-violet ices her silky, a tortuous cream of a color.

O mother, why can’t I whisper, muster a pathetic, brittle sigh?

I am an exceptional wanderer, I can disavow his lovely aerie of truth,

But be dear and bury me first.

For I have learned to make do with my glass lioness,

her cotton a white, white foam.

My echo wears the rosemary, and I fall back, I know.

Prattle to the mirror fifty-two dreams, in truth, it will not crack.

It will smile with me and the man to whom I could speak.

He screams that between alucinari and a luminary lies “my.”

Nikita Bastin, CA, Saint Francis High School

ALL OTHER CERTIFIED NATIONAL WINNERS

An Aggregation of Voids - Jillian Ritchey, MI, Clarkston HS

Coffee Cream - S. J. Ross, MT, home-schooled

Blank Epitaph on the Moor - Emily O'Connell, MA, Tantasqua Reg HS

to Ashes - Su Min Kim, NJ, Bergen County Academies

Rueful Wires Shall Be Replaced - Audrey Welk, OR, Tualatin HS

Withered - Saul Quintero, TX, Rouse High School

Amour-Propre - Shruti Kumar, NJ, Bridgewater-Raritan High School

Canvases - Anna KLochman, MO, Blue Springs Freshman Center

Human Noise - Voulette Hattar, CA, Valencia High School

Shattering The Bell Jar - Georgie Geen - VA, Hanover High School

Grandfather - S. Ana Henriquez, TX, The Atonement Academy

Ferris Bueller's Dream Off - Kyra Charles, MO, Oak Grove HS

The Problem with Describing The Grand Canyon - Amanda Dettmann, ME, Yarmouth High School

Child of Earth - Crystal Overstreet, GA, Georgia Cyber Academy

Vulnerability in the bare bones of sanctuary - Mya Holbrook, IN, Franklin Community High School

Do Not Forget To Fall In Love With Being Alive - Leena Ghannam, MI, Berkley High School

Downstream - Mahwish Amir, TX, Harmony School of Science HS 

JUST POETRY!!! & the Live Poets Society of NJ

legitimately good poetry since 1998

no fooling, no kidding, no scamming.