Poetry Contests

Flagstones (DRL § 170 (7)). My Pain is Like an Old Friend, Venus Still Lives  by Catherine McCabe-Strong
 

Flagstones (DRL § 170 (7))

I went back to the secret
waterfall where once
we professed our love
and poured libations to the gods,
only the river had dried
to a trickle
and was choked
with leaves.

I stood there
alone
on the wide dry stones,
listening to the humbled
murmur of lost waters,
and realized
that when the river was gone
it became a road.

 

My Pain is Like an Old Friend

It’s the kind of friend
you can’t really remember
how you met, or why
you still hang out.

The kind of friend
who gives you a monkey’s paw
and tells you it works
just like a genie’s lamp,
go ahead, make a wish.

The kind of friend
your Momma warned you about,
who gets you hooked on drugs
and drags you down dark alleys.

The kind of friend
who takes you to the banks
of a wide river, and says
stay here.  Float for a while.
Drift on the meditation of agony,
and tell me what you learn.

Venus Still Lives

She fled her abusive
husband, and made
her way to a small city.
She studies medicine
now.  She wants to help
women and children.
And in the quiet
and the stillness
of her foreign home,
she finds new worship
from online acolytes
and a woman who loves
her, the way she has never
been loved before.

 

Catherine McCabe-Strong

Internal Conflict, Sarah, 7.19.2017 by Cameron Kowalczewski
 

Internal Conflict 

7.19.2017 

 

Cameron Kowalczewski

Audio Poem by Nicole Favata
 

I was an open book and she was a treasure chest
Locked
And she had already swallowed the key
I didn’t see past her beautiful smile and her funny jokes
But that’s all she was
I learned nothing about her
Not even her last name
She told me nothing 
And I told her everything
I let her in
And she left me on the welcome mat to dust off my feet
And try the bell again
I never got an answer
Days passed
And hearing from her is like hearing the chirp of a robin
When you’re six feet underwater
She isn’t concerned with you
And yet you care for her
Like she’s the most precious thing to ever walk this earth
Love comes when it is needed
And you are not it
Just a pit stop on my road trip 
I don’t hate you for who you are
I feel sorry
Sorry that love approached you and you slammed the door in its face
And used your 140 characters to say good-bye

 

Nicole Favata

The Perfect Woman by Rax Piper
 

For 21 years, I’ve been trying to force myself to be someone I’m not.

I grew up with an image of “the perfect woman” ingrained in my mind.
She is more soft, more generous, and dances in rivers.
She wears sundresses and always knows how to make others happy.
She is the right kind of quiet, the correct amount of emotional.
She can show off her legs without also showing off scars. 
She has been my definition for so long that I no longer remember who put her there.

Perhaps at one time I was a soft dancer, but life has a funny way of forcing you to survive.

I am fire and earth,
and I’m not sorry I’m too much for you.

The Games We Play by Mackayla Poorman
 

He’d fallen into a pit of
New depths
This time.

The feeling was different;
The nothing was different.

He felt no responsibility;
He was so responsible.

His head was a clutter;
His life was a clutter.

He was a void.

His expressions now
are borrowed.

He wakes up
in the middle of the night
to nothing
And stumbles
Back to sleep.

Are we ever really awake?

Those sessions don’t work:
Normalcy is a cage
He’d long realized that.

By now,
It wouldn’t make a difference
Anyway.

Sharing just feels like a bigger burden.

How can someone
feel so light 
and yet so
Heavy
At the same time?

Smiling feels foreign,
Even when it comes
naturally.

Teeth bared and
Aching.

Rotten.

Where in the world are you?

So many babies crying-
How do you sleep?

Where in the world are you?

Nowhere.

Where.
       Are.
            You.