| . |
| . |
| T.P.S. Excellence Contest Winners Poems below have been posted on site with authors prior permission. Those not shown respectively declined and had the right to do so. All poems can however be found in past publications and issues of Poetize Magazine. All copyrights rest with the Author. |
| Summer Competition - June 1, 2007 Helen McInerny - Pennsylvania USA In His Hands In His hands he holds all things Pertaining to my life. Nothing comes but through Him first, Neither joy nor strife. In the valley of suffering, He molds me to His plan, Then takes me to a mountain top, And I rest in peace again. There is no growth on the mountain, No demand is made of me. Only as I pass through the valley, Am I allowed to see. That in the time of wandering, And in the place of pain, My spirit melts into His own, And two are one again. Copyright © Helen McInerny -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Winter Competition - December 1, 2007 Joanne Cucinello - New York USA He's Gone The sun now ending its long walk across the sky peeks again through the willow. It's quiet now. She sits by the window looking at the garden and this aging man who once she knew as lover mate now more like a child, a lost one at that, but still a man in form the man she loved for all these years who calls her Sally now, Sally some girl he knew when he was young. Sally doesn't live here and this is not his home in West Virginia. He keeps looking for his dog long dead calling out "Scotty! Come here, boy." And she sits and watches as he clips the branches of the small bush that sits alone at the back of the yard. She's thinking how like branches his mind is being clipped away each day. Soon he'll come through the door yelling and asking why she's sitting in his house and where's Sally? And the wedding pictures on the bureau stare back at him like strangers toasting ghosts. She sits by the window holding screams beneath her breath of frozen tears and weeps silent even as the fireflies begin their dance. He's lost the man she loved locked in some forbidden space within his mind growing deeper and deeper away lost to all who called him friend and father and Darling. "I can't find Scotty," he mumbles teary-eyed through the door and she cups his face in her tender hands trying to find him somewhere. Night brings its close around them and he smiles and pats her hair and plants his small kiss upon her cheek "I love you, Sally." Copyright © Joanne Cucinello -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Summer Competition - June 1, 2008 Joseph Meckes - Pennsylvania USA Grandpa's Love This little child has a place in my heart that only a child can see where patience, love, and tenderness will never cease to be. A place where understanding lives and kindness guides the way a helping hand with lots of smiles and laughter every day. This little child will know the love of a Grandpa filled with pride a gentle touch, a whiskery kiss; with tickles down the side. A game to play, a song to sing, some time to fly a kite a lesson in the golden rule and learning wrong from right. A tear to share, some time to dream, a hug that's really tight a rainy day, a baseball game, perhaps a childish fright. This little child will come to know that Grandpa's love is real and given with a guarantee that no one else can steal. My days are short; I cannot stay, there's other work to do for God will call me home with Him and I must say adieu. This little child will grow to know what God has given me a special love; a Grandpa's love that only a child can see. Copyright © Joseph Meckes -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Winter Competition - December 1, 2008 Peter Joseph Adams - Georgia USA They Soon Forgot The Cosmonaut He is an island insignificant Amidst a sea magnificent To be passed over by the eye While the world storms and quakes All alone he floats and waits The man above the sky One cannot follow A heart long hollow For nothing's there to lead His simple crime Was wishing time Would move another speed But the world passed right by Time stays content to fly It will never postpone And our Cosmonaut The world forgot So he floats away, alone. Copyright © Peter Joseph Adams -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Summer Competition - June 1, 2009 Kilian McDonnell - Minnesota USA At Dusk Up the hill between lake and window come fawn and doe. They see me, but stand beneath the dead oak unafraid. Does the wild know something the old monk forgets? I move and they are gone. Copyright © Kilian McDonnell -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Winter Competition - December 1, 2009 Joanne Cucinello - New York USA Early Riser When I sit in my room of many windows especially at early morn gratefulness fills me. As the sun pokes through the trees, there are silken strings hanging, shimmering fine threads of the Master who was weaving while I slept. I wonder on this particular sunrise as I watch them sway caught in passing by a trembled breeze how light of sun can play upon them fragile chords of morning song, silent beads of glistening dew ascending descending stretched across each silver filament coloring hints of rainbow visible only in this brief encounter spared with grace for early risers. Copyright © Joanne Cucinello -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Summer Competition - June 1, 2010 James Kenneth Waltzer - Texas USA To Escape -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Winter Competition - December 1, 2010 Charlene Rene Geist - Minnesota, USA Avalanche (Poem Will Be Posted Soon!) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Summer Competition - June 1, 2011 Penny Carson - South Carolina, USA Honky-Tonk-Bar-Fly Thursday afternoon we arrive like clockwork not much going on yet, but give it time Your arm supports my lower back and your Old Spice fights for breathing space alongside cigarette smoke, beer, perfume and pickled pigs feet . The jukebox pulses with Leroy Van Dyke just walk on by, wait on the corner You deposit me at the bar like a check that requires a three day waiting period You call to the lady on the other side of the bar (while slapping a few bills down) watch out for her . Occasionally some cowboy walks up, pinches my cheeks or buys me a fresh refill. My eyes follow you. In between winks at whatever woman is looking, the pool cue in your hand sings as another illusion disappears in the side pocket. My body starts to sway to the music on the jukebox. Patsy Cline? Loretta Lynn? I'm not sure. It doesn't matter . My bottle is long empty and I am close to passing out on the bar you stroll over and pick me up calling me your best girl whirling me around while teary-eyed women admire you . I whisper "Daddy I'm hungry can we go now?" You call to the lady on the other side of the bar (while slapping a few bills down) watch out for her. Copyright © Penny Carson -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Winter Competition - December 1, 2011 Amanda Diane Wilmong - Farmers Daughter (Poem to post soon!) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Winter Competition - December 1, 2012 Richard Shultz - Dancing Angel The poet's blood upon the page Is the scarlet scimitar that carves My heart to tattered Lean and awkward metaphors That climb past understanding into eternity, Where my eyes will render all I have been, All I have done stern and silent And carry me on to paradise There my soul shall be wrapped In a white cocoon of words, And when the butterfly emerges On wings of golden verse, Only then shall I surrender To her, that my pride Has always sought. My dancing lovely angel, death Copyright © Richard Schultz Summer Competition - June 1, 2013 Joanne Cucinello - Necessary I am waiting like the small acorn left behind and buried in the barren earth of winter waiting for the warm rays of springtime's sun to open up my heart again with light do we all not close that inner door when daylight's scarce and night is long how necessary then this test to pause and stay within the heart's perimeter and muddle through the aches of our decisions past, that walk us through the labyrinth there is no undoing yet the years leave memories with faded watermarks, blurring truth sometimes, as the mind grows weary in the dark. so come sweet light add your colors softly painted to this waiting canvas of my thirsty soul and I will, like the acorn, part this earth and bloom again. Copyright © Joanne Cucinello Winter Competition - December 1, 2013 Ingeborg von Finsterwalde - Winter Splendor A hush settled over the diminutive valley The pine trees dressed in Christmas splendor Whispered tales of wonder and merriment The ice maiden has touched the waterfall She will keep it suspended in her frigid grip Turning the sheer wall of flowing water Into a white wispy veil of impenetrable beauty Hark to the wind reciting his ageless melody While the creatures inhabiting the land go to sleep Only the moon and the stars watch in silence While the lights from the village linger momentarily Then darkness lays siege to the day NEW CONTEST DEADLINE : June 1, 2015 ENTER TODAY! |