Winners! Telling Tales of Dusk poetry contest

Thank you to everyone who participated in my little poetry contest. First prize and winner of a copy of Terri Kirby Erickson’s book Telling Tales of Dusk went to D.B. Cox for the poem “elegy for ‘king cotton’” Second place went to Yossarain Hunter for “dixie, rising again”.  And third went to Chris Deal, for his poem, “Concerning Thoughts of Home”. Yossarain and Chris Deal will receive embroidered handkerchiefs in honor of Erickson’s poem “Queen Anne’s Lace”.

elegy for ‘king cotton’
— for my grandfather
By D.B. Cox

there’s a hole in the sky
down by riverside
where the cotton mill
once blocked the sun
smokestack shattered
red bricks scattered like war
along a stagnant pond
the relentless clatter
of iron looms
that once weaved its way
through spider-cracked
windows & under closed doors
lately replaced
by an alien silence
that has settled
on the mill village
like a sheet
tossed over a death-bed
grim-faced workers
once fetched
by the screaming whistle
three shifts a day
six days a week
to stream through
revolving metal gates
gone—
white bones
in the ground
the last page of “king cotton”
written on a spinning wind
by wrecking-ball & crane—
there’s a hole in the sky
down by riverside

dixie, rising again
By Yossarian Hunter

campfires on the levee,
acoustic guitars.
coolers full of ice
& beer

miniskirts & sundresses,
girls
riding pillion
on Harley-Davidsons

jesus trees & azaleas.
purple wisteria vines

the return migration
of barflies
to wrought iron perches,
cocktail waitresses &
patio umbrellas

Mississippi,
eleven April
anno domini twenty
& a dime.
that the gods
themselves
should live
so well

Concerning Thoughts of Home
by Chris Deal

-cinder and ash
snake and root and
the unmistakable
smell of rain
and shit.

-monuments
to the worst
of us.

-the civil dead
and the familial
relations, a
trailer burned
to nothing.

-australian
shepherds and
chestnuts that
stick to the
soft belly of
your feet.

-her dark
smile, black
eyes, the
best of us.

jessicasmith

: Aspiring human, loyal writer, adequate aspirer.

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