Image © @Doug88888 (flickr.com)
#yarn5 Contest!
As you know, we traditionally hold a poetry contest during National Poetry Month–last year’s “Random Word Contest,” judged by John Corey Whaley, was a smashing success. We’ve waited all year to bring you another one!
This year, to celebrate our fifth year of publication, we are holding the #yarn5 Contest! The #yarn5 is a poetry contest calling for any and all riffs on the number five. This could be anything from 5-line poems to 5-word poems to poems featuring five characters or the five senses to anything marvelously wild and creative and 5-relevant as it can be. Anything is game as long as it fits in the theme of five!
This year, our guest judge is none other than super-agent, YA author, and YARN alum John Cusick, who will be selecting the winning entries and offering the fab prizes outlined below.
Here are the rules and guidelines:
- Your poem/poems must fit in with the #yarn5 theme.
- Post your poem/s in the Comments section below, and be sure to include your name and contact info. Feel free to talk up the contest and your entry on twitter using the #yarn5 hashtag!
- Submissions will be open from April 1st and will close on April 20th 5pm EST.
- We will compile all the entries and have our guest judge, John Cusick – literary agent with Greenhouse Literary and author of the YA novels, “Girl Parts” and “Cherry Money Baby” – choose a winner and a runner-up.
- The winner will receive a 10-page critique from super-agent John, along with an audio book of “Girl Parts.” The runner-up will get a copy of the print edition of “Cherry Money Baby.” Plus both winners will be given the opportunity to have MORE of his/her fiction/nonfiction/poetry published on YARN!
What are you waiting for? Ready….. Set….. 1……. 2…… 3…… 4……. 5…….!!!!
Cardboard Boxes
Five cardboard boxes pulled out
Ships sailing over the seas
Tunnels below a deep dark cave
A castle filled with kings and queens
Five big boxes change a kid’s day
The Five Golden Rings of Emily Sue
The first ring came for Emily Sue
When her mother called the world to say she was due
The second came when she turned sixteen
It was young love that gave her that ring
And when Emily Sue turned twenty-three
The love of her life got down on his knees
The worst ring came when she was fifty-two
The doctor apologized when he gave her the news
The church bells chimed on a day so blue
It was the final ring for Emily Sue
Love In Every Sense
My lips kiss off your salty tears
Your napping breath both sweet and sour
I could watch you sleep for hours
A chubby palm encircles one pointer
Mama.. no lovelier sound
Patty and others with similar questions–We have to “approve” all comments/poems, so sometimes there is a delay! If you don’t see your poem, please email editors[at]yareview.net
I Am
Five days, every week – I am someone that I am not
I type menial sentences to form ideas that do not matter to me
I wear a freshly scented mask of make-up and glitz to please people that may not even know my name
My face is adorned with a smile that resembles a five year old girl wearing her mother’s clothes
Five nights, every week – I am someone that I am
I put words together that evolve into ideas that truly matter to me
I wear T-shirts that could be mistaken for cleaning rags; if it were not for their neatly folded state
My eyes are ablaze with the possibilities of my future when I gaze upon those that matter to me
It is easy for me to mourn the loss of myself – five days, every week
But five nights, every week – I emerge through the thick fog clinging to the lantern of creativity
And as the thoughts and ideas pour out of me with the burning intensity of molten metal
I find a sense of peace because five nights, every week – I get to be someone that I am
And what a gift five nights can be!
I just noticed that there was a typo on my poem. (So much for using my cell phone.)
I’m attaching the corrected version here:
I hold my hand behind my back,
all five fingers stretched out,
If you get it right
I’ll do anything you ask.
My daughter looks up at me
Eyes bright, full of hope.
Three, she says.
“Antique Shopping”
Pale white gold chips away into a tarnished pewter
A spider web of cracked glass
The mirror, whose face showed a foggy reflection
waited
Entering the frame came the feeble man once again.
Deep impressions of frown lines pulled tighter around chapped lips
Yellow fingernails bring themselves to touch and graze
Just below the circles that embedded themselves under his eyes,
His mouth opening ever so slightly.
After poking the places he didn’t like,
His eyes flickered to his razor
Picking it up, not even bothering with the cream,
He dragged it across his chin-
Fat drops of red rolled down desperately.
He gave no movement only for that frozen second.
The clatter of the razor happened somewhere far away
There really was no pain, not any that was important enough to acknowledge
His gaze returned to the mirror,
Bringing his fingers to touch the cracked glass
Pale blue eyes bore into the mirror
Spider web veins can be seen below the surface of translucent skin
The man, whose face showed nothing but occasional frustrated questioning
Stood toward his distortion,
Staring.
[…] Alexis Jensen on CONTEST!! […]