Winners
Conformists of a feather
flock together.
Michael R. Burch, Nashville, Tennessee
The u of solitude allays the y of lonely.
The i in if precedes the o in only.
Michael Harmon, Scottsdale, Arizona
Runners Up
I sympathize truly my dear,
But as you see, I have a beer.
Robert Walton, King City, California
It’s always the common folk who must pay
When their leaders go looking for dragons to slay.
David Martin, Chantilly, Virginia
Honorable Mentions
Knowledge, bestow thy light upon the mind,
Lest pleasures waste and lucent trifles blind.
Joseph McKenzie, New Mexico
Face drenched with tears I wipe my eyes
with hope God hears my fervent cries
Jan Hersh
I want the facts that will inform my views.
I don’t need entertainment from my news.
James Ph. Kotsybar, Lompoc, California
Mid the forest, Dryad stood; hidden, oaken, silent wood,
Mid the glade, the Sun he splayed; folk content, they never strayed.
Neal Dachstadter, Knoxville, Tennessee
Participating Judges
Michael Curtis, Washington, DC
Joshua Philipp, Queens, New York
Damian Robin, Sheffield, United Kingdom
William Ruleman, Athens, Tennessee
James Sale, Bournemouth, United Kingdom
Bruce Dale Wise, Naselle, Washington
Judge Michael Curtis poetically noted:
If I could improve it
I didn’t choose it.
I looked for wit, precision too,
Heart-felt feelings wouldn’t do.
__________________________________________________________________
RULES: To celebrate National Poetry Month, write a two-line poem (couplet) that rhymes. It’s nice to have some meter or the same number of syllables per line, but not required. Paste your poem into the comment section with your name, city, and state (no need to list your last name or email address if you don’t want to). No submission fee.
DEADLINE: April 30 midnight (***Deadline extended to May 1, midnight EST). Winner announced May 10.
PRIZE: Free Society of Classical Poets 2016 Journal due out later this spring.
JUDGE: Classical poets staff and advisory board will judge (which means they can’t compete, sorry)
Featured Image: “Candidates for Girton College” by Frederick Brown, 1884.
The loss we endure is a wound unseen.
Internal stitches are so tough to clean.
Conformists of a feather
flock together.
Michael R. Burch, Nashville, Tennessee
When the cloud eclipsed the sun it became the bright full moon;
Distilled in fragrant euphony, untouched but loved too soon.
Moonlight was showered
down the valley like an eternal perfume
Down a gauntlet of eyes I cringe my way
In the shadow of the man not beside me
I work from dawn to dusk for my bread
I work the hells ye angels fear to tread
The trouble with using half-rhyme
Is that it tends to sound rather tame
Please give me one more night,
I just wanna make things right.
What a fine sight – a child full of delight,
laughing and running and flying a kite!
Catharsis
If each poem would mirror a writer’s sin
There would be nothing left for priests to deem.
Frail, but resilient, emerging from drifts,
Wan petals, yet brilliant, as Winter’s coat lifts.
Soliloquy.
……………..
Between all that we’ve forgotten and between the things we’ve shared
There is such a warm sensation in the ways that we’ve both cared…
The world must change its borders
This land is not for hoarders
A word absurdly dreams of belonging.
To be forever phrased — longing’s longing.
Ted
I am six
Do you have anything to fix?
Kidz havta wear kevlar pjs 2 bed
2 wake up not shot dead
Chicago
The thing that she regretted most:
not putting poison on his toast.
Plymouth, England
The border is vast, majestic, and tall
That’s why it is called The Great Wall
A sign of life that flits from tree to tree,
‘Tis spring’s hello–the errant bumblebee.
Conservatives are fools: that’s just hors d’oeuvreative:
Because not every fool is a conservative.
Leggy Girls Days
A clock: you’ve got to walk it straight and narrow:
Pyramid based on truth I built as last Pharaoh.
Monkey is a feeling in front of the window;
Smile is healing even the Caliban`sorrow;
You are my little bow and I am the arrow,
I have in my hands the joy of a sparrow;
You learn by heart my lyrics like mellow;
Because, really I am a good funny fellow;
Peoples burn pain all in my bone marrow;
No night will fall down like a crowing crow
And let the struggle for an other tomorrow;
Each day is a leggy girl who still can borrow
No moments of my poem: a cloak to wrap a sorrow.
The clowns and the lions and stunt acts are great.
Where are we, the circus? No, prezy debate!
San Jose, CA
I’ll come tonight, my love, tonight, she said
The perfumed words I wish I’d never read.
I wrote a verse
That was too terse
“Hamlet’s Least Soliloquy,” by Skip Hughes of Greenfield, Indiana
An owlish phrase, to wit to woo, or not to woo
Yon maiden fair, is not the question hitherto.