Saving Power Creek*
May 30, 2012
2012 Merit Award
By Jacob Hartsoch
Saving Power Creek
I found you here, flush with mud,
twisted over your shovel in silence,
the headwaters choked in silt.
Dig, you said, and shoulder to shoulder,
we learned about each other,
until after dusk the sound came back,
metallic whir through culverts
a sparkle in your ear.
My boys should know of this I think.
When the spawning starts we come again,
work down through the drainage,
slant light popping through alders.
You kneel down next to a discarded roe,
put a single egg in my son’s tiny hand,
pink on pink.
Further down we spot the coho,
taller than the flow, skittering upstream,
the boys dancing in rubber boots.
*Copyright 2012 by Jacob Hartsoch. Placard design by Egress Studio.
Like this:
My Ladder*
May 26, 2012
2012 Merit Award
By Don Cramer
My Ladder
An aluminum ladder hangs on the wall outside my shop.
Extended, it’s nearly as long as the building.
Smoke-blue paint spots adorn its upper steps,
Flakes left after painting the house three summers ago.
Remnants of needles have nestled into the treads,
Left over from the annual cleaning of the gutters.
When I tried to lower a dangling widow-maker,
It fell and bent the ladder’s bottom rung.
Credit the manufacturer, the rung did not break.
Credit my prep, the ladder stayed tied to the tree.
Annually I brace the ladder at the angle of the roof,
Then carry shingles to patch it before the rains.
I take it on junkets to help neighbors harvest apples.
Its neck sticks out and waves a big red bandana.
My stability depends on how well I plant the ladder.
I gauge my stamina by how much vertigo I experience.
I am handing this marvelous tool over to my grandson.
It can get him from down here to up there and back.
*Copyright 2012 by Don Cramer. Placard design by Egress Studio.
Like this:
Asperger’s*
May 19, 2012
2012 Merit Award
By Finnigan Cooper, 5th grade
Asperger’s
I have Asperger’s as you can see,
and most of you don’t get life to me,
I hate it when people yell all around,
my brain can’t compute all the sound,
all brains spark but mine gets on fire,
when you tell jokes that are not in desire,
it unlocks memories of things that are sad,
I really can’t help it if you think I’m bad,
brains are like highways and thoughts are like cars,
but they go straight like most of ours,
but my highway has stops and smaller roads attached,
so my thoughts pick up more thoughts
so more thoughts are latched,
my brain records movies, pictures, and shows,
I even record movies of my very own,
I plan things in my head when I run around,
I even watch them with real life sound,
sometimes Asperger’s can be such a pain
but my life is nowhere done and I have much to gain.
*Copyright 2012 by Finnigan Cooper. Placard design by Egress Studio.
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My Mother’s Afterlife*
May 18, 2012
From time to time, in no special order, we will post winning poems from the 2012 Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest along with (very reduced-size) images of the placards that will be displayed inside Whatcom Transportation Authority buses. The complete list of winners from all years is available on the Winners page, with links to the individual poems on this site.
2012 Merit Award
By Elizabeth Vignali
My Mother’s Afterlife
She prepares for our arrival—
brushes pine needles off the table,
unfurls the checkered cloth
with a snap
of her wrist.
Mourning doves hush
as she stacks clacking
kindling next to the firepit
dead with ashes.
When she ceases
they cry to each other
across the shrouding mist.
She sets out canvas
camping chairs and rests
in the one nearest the pond.
She has years to wait.
A nymph lumbers from under
the verdant surface
onto a cow lily and dances
into its dragonfly shape.
New wings unfurled, it sees her
with many eyes.
It clings to the old body, its pale
new one jewelling blue-green.
*Copyright 2012 by Elizabeth Vignali. Placard design by Egress Studio.
Like this:
look and listen!
May 15, 2012
The winning poets from the 2012 Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest stand in front of a wall displaying all of the poems submitted to this year’s contest. Photo by Nancy Canyon.
Did you miss the awards ceremony? Did you attend and wish you could do it all over again? Now you can listen to it, right here. The podcast is in two parts. Click on PART 1 and then PART 2 to hear the full ceremony. The podcast also resides on the poetrynight site (look for the date 5/10/12). The first voice you will hear is emcee Jim Bertolino.
Our special thanks to Boris D. Schleinkofer, who recorded and mastered the podcast.
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Thank You, Whatcom County!
May 11, 2012
What a wonderful evening of poetry and celebration. The awards ceremony for the 7th Annual Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest was fun, delicious and inspiring. The poems selected by judges Betty Scott and Jeffrey Morgan were filled with astute reflection, humor and well-honed language. Plus, they were read beautifully by the poets.
The dome room at the Bellingham Cruise Terminal was packed with an attentive audience. Through the windows that served as a backdrop to the poets, the audience was treated to a view of a perfect May evening, across Bellingham Bay all the way to the snowy peaks of Canada.
There’s more to come… The event was podcast by poet Boris Schleinkofer and we’ll post a link to the podcast soon. In the coming months, most of the winning poets will be taped for broadcast by Bellingham TV 10 and their readings will be shown between other programming on the local station and also posted on YouTube, with links on this page.
By about July, we expect to have the Walk Award plaques completed for installation in front of the Bellingham Public Library, and the colorful placards, designed by Egress Studio, delivered to Whatcom Transportation Authority for their year-long bus tour around the county. We’ll be posting the placards on this site as well and they’ll be linked to the poems listed on the Winners page.
We’re extremely grateful to our judges, donors (both $ and in-kind) audience and planning committee. And we’re especially grateful to all of the poets throughout Whatcom County who submitted poems to the contest, whether or not they were selected as winners.
We’ll offer a little more gratitude in a coming post, but for the moment, special thanks to Dean Kahn and photographer Andy Bronson from The Bellingham Herald, who covered last night’s event and were inadvertently left off the thank-you list.
Thank you, one and all…and congratulations for participating in and supporting this wonderful community event!
—–
chapbook of winning poems designed by Ellie Rogers
cover photo of Mt. Shuksan © Marc Griffin
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Heralded!
May 2, 2012
Check The Bellingham Herald!
celebrate poets and poetry…
April 24, 2012
You are invited to join this year’s Sue Boynton Poetry Contest winning poets, their families, friends and fans, for a poetry reading and celebration of community creativity.
The awards ceremony will be held Thursday, May 10, 2012, 7:00pm, at the Bellingham Cruise Terminal, 355 Harris Street in Fairhaven. The winning poems will be read by their authors and all poems that were submitted to this year’s contest will be on display. As always, the awards ceremony is free. A chapbook of winning poems from this year’s contest will be available for purchase. Please join us!
Contest update…
April 18, 2012
Congratulations, Whatcom County, for another fine showing of poetic creativity. Our illustrious judges, Betty Scott and Jeffrey Morgan, have read each and every poem and met the challenge: to choose a slate of winners from the nearly 300 poems submitted.
To see what “nearly 300″ poems looks like, stop by the Bellingham Public Library between now and May 9 and take a look at the display (near the Reference Desk). Impressive!
To help this year’s winners celebrate, and to hear them read their poems, please join us at the Sue Boynton Poetry Contest awards ceremony on Thursday, May 10, 2012, 7:00pm, at the Bellingham Cruise Terminal in Fairhaven. It’s free.
Following the awards ceremony, we’ll begin posting the winning poems on this site and linking each poem to its name on the Winners page.
Meanwhile, please extend your congratulations to the 2012 Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest winners: Kari Galbraith, Bob Hicks, Peter Howard-Snyder, William Howard-Snyder, David M. Laws, Carole MacRury, Sheila Nickerson, Judy Orvik, Cindi Williamson, Margarethe Zubler-Keller, Finnigan Cooper, Don Cramer, Ella Denham-Conroy, Denise duMaurier, Carly Eathorne, Maria Frazey, Jacob Hartsoch, Andrew Shattuck McBride, Wendy McLeod, Ali Morrow, Nicola Morrow, Jon A. Orvik, Théa Rosenburg, George Such and Elizabeth Vignali.
Like this:
first day of Spring…
March 20, 2012
Spring Fall*
By Johanna Landis
2006 Merit Award
Naïve, pinkly fresh to a fault,
cherry blossoms fluff themselves.
Blinking wide-eyed petals,
they clump together
like high school girls headed
for the bathroom.
Unbeknownst to them,
their bloom will be quick,
their fall in still-early spring.
The prettiest ones
learn best.
*Copyright 2006 by Johanna Landis. This poem appears in POETRY WALK: Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest – The First Five Years. Placard design by Egress Studio.
