2nd Annual Belizean Poets Contest
“There will be three broad categories. There will be emerging poets junior, those are poets who are ages fifteen and under, emerging poets senior, who are over fifteen, and accomplished poets. Now the difference between emerging poets and accomplished poets is that emerging poets are poets who are not well know, they aren’t performing, they haven’t published and they haven’t recorded. Accomplished poets are known to the Belizean public. They’ve either published a book, made a CD, done a video or have been out there performing on stage.”
“This year poets will be competing for some very beautiful trophies. They will be video recording deals, CD recording deals and other poetry related prizes. Cash and other prizes that would help to aid people in developing the art of poetry.”
- Adele Ramos-Daly on Channel 5 News, Monday, July 31, 2006
If you love to write poetry and want to compete for trophy, video and CD recording deals, poetry-related prizes and cash, then the Second Annual Belizean Poets Contest is the competition for you. We're graduating from paper certificates to JEX TROPHIES, and you can take home this impressive keepsake to show off to family and friends.
This year, Belizean poets of all ages can participate. There will be two broad contest categories:
EMERGING POETS – poets who are not known as performing or published poets:
Junior Emerging Poets for poets age 15 and under;
Senior Emerging Poets for poets over 15
ACCOMPLISED POETS
For all published, recorded and performing poets
All you have to do is submit 2 new and unpublished poems. They should be typewritten, not more than a page long, titled, dated (with at least the year of writing), and carry the author’s by-line. One poem should be relevant to the 208th anniversary of the Battle of St. George’s Caye; the other should be relevant to the 25th anniversary of Belize’s Independence.
Submit entries at the Bliss by Friday, August 18, 2006.
Entry Forms and Contest Rules can be downloaded from the website: www.freewebs.com/belizeanpoetscontest2006 or requested by e-mail from: belizeanpoets@gmail.com.
The finalists from the contest will be asked to undergo one more leg of competition. On Wednesday, September 6, 2006, they will be asked to perform on the Palm Court of the Bliss Center for the Performing Arts. Judges will select 1st, 2nd and 3rd place for each broad category.
The event is called the Belizean Poets Showdown and appears on the official September Celebrations Calendar.
ME
by Edwina Armstrong
Sweet peace surrounds me
as I take time out for loving me
accepting what nature is offering free
like the quite waters and calm seas
a butterfly caressing a slight breeze
as the soft ground accepts new leaves
this sweet peace welcomes me
enjoying this time precious to me
steady rain on my window pane
is a reward from heaven
a blessing gained
things for me have really changed
as in my mind these memories framed
daily a new experience for me as I accept
these gifts from nature to me
as the sunlight rejuvenates me and my feet
dangles in the cool sea,
smiling to myself
glancing at heaven
I thank God for pleasuring me
Sailing through the darkness...and veering into the light
BY ADELE RAMOS-DALY
Signing at the July 7, 2006, book launch (Photo above by LE ROI HYDE)
"THE LIGHT, THE DARK, AND EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN is a book in which she draws upon her own deep personal experiences. It is a book on her poetry, her writings, and her philosophies on life. It can be considered an extensive overview on her life and world. In it she tells/bears/portrays all. She sheds her skin and leaves her life exposed."
Angela Gegg, aka Proshka, launched her first poetry book at the Image Factory on Friday, July 7, 2006, with great fanfare. An enthusiastic fanclub was drawn mostly from the higher echelons of Belizean society, and the Prime Minister, Hon. Said Musa, himself, was present at the launch, where the celebratory energy was high enough to catapult this expressive artistist to the moon.
The Light, The Dark, and Everything in Between. The 200-page anthology is not about "the birds and the bees," says Angela, but about her memoirs, her philisophies--it's about a self-determined young woman thinking outside "the minature box," inside which chauvenists have unsucessfully tried to place her.
She said that even though she has been writing since she was a young girl, the earliest poems in the anthology were written in 2001. She included some of what she felt were her strong poetry pieces in her first exhibit, and the response was very encouraging.
But when she finally decided to publish, she was met with rebuffs like: "Poetry doesn't sell." "People' don't read," etc. -- negative remarks intended to make her believe that what she wanted to accomplish could not be done. She firmly rejected that philosophy and demonstrated that her own philosophy would dominate in the end.
Facing the all-too-familiar rejection Belizean writers get from established publishing houses, Angela self-published her book under Proshka Productions, and she told Belly Full that she is willing to work along with other writers who want to publish their works as well.
Angela was determined to show Belize and the world that she can achieve whatever she conceives. She launched the book with virbrant art pieces from her digital photography and paintings, featuring a kaleidescope of colors and forms that portray the vitality of life, creation and recreation. Titled Hott Chicks Can Paint Too, the exhibit exposes Proshka's pride in the feminine form and her fascination with the nuances painted in nature.
Angela is also a restauranteer. She is the proprietor of Smokey Mermaid Restaurant - a classy, cozy off-the-beaten venue in Belize City where patrons can eat in fresh air enveloped in an exotic, nature-inspired ambience.
She lives a very full life, as she also adds fitness expert to the list of her qualifications.
|
E-mail: proshkart@yahoo.com |
MOTHERS
by “Carlos”
If my tears you do not see
Am just trying to be strong
To hide my deep emotions
Though I know it is so wrong
Cause what I feel for Mothers
In this earth, cannot be touched
To your love, I shall concede
To value life as much
It’s you I turn to every time
When my journey, I’ve seem to lost
Yet in a quiet but subtle way you say
“Son, there is no cost”
And should you know, it is just tough
For me to so express
Yet look at me and brag I will
Cause thru' your Love, I shall be blessed
For thru' time, I have become
Cognizant of the fact
That the love I sometimes forget to give
You grant it two-fold back
So rest assured, this comes from me
From deep within I say
Blessed may you all remain
Cherished Mothers of today
Garifuna legend and poet, Auntie Madé, passes
A highly celebrated Garifuna poet, Marcella Lewis, affectionately known as Auntie Madé, passed away on Thursday, July 20, 2006.
Marcella was a poet extraordinaire and possessed a unique and awe inspiring gift of expressing the Garifuna world view in the language of her forefathers. Her poetry was first published by the Stann Creek Education Office in a modest collection called “Chülüha Dan” in 1978. A more extensive collection of her writing, entitled “Walagante Marcella - Marcella our Legacy,” was later co-published by Producciones de la Hamaca and the NGC in 1994.
Auntie Madé was a stalwart of the National Garifuna Council since its inception. She was very passionate about the preservation and survival of Garifuna language, culture and values and, to that end, she spent countless hours working with youths to ensure that the heritage was passed on. She was among the group that helped to compile the People’s Garifuna Dictionary, which was published in 1991, and many researchers from different parts of the world who came to Hopkins to study the Garifuna language consulted with her. As a result of her tutelage, Hopkins, for many years, dominated the Miss Garifuna Belize Contest.
The NGC recognized her immense contribution to Garifunaduáü and the Garifuna community at the 18th Annual NGC Convention held in Hopkins in March 2002 by making her the first recipient of the Barauda Award (named after the wife of the Legendary Chief Joseph Satuyé).
In August of 2005, the NGC and friends of Marcella established the Marcella Lewis Scholarship Fund to assist deserving students with their high school education.
The board of directors and branches of the NGC join the family, friends and admirers of Marcella Lewis in mourning her loss and in celebrating the life of this Garifuna matriarch. We bid her spirit Godspeed and a safe and easy passage to Seiri among the ancestors.
Bungiu buma, Auntie Madé.
(Adapted from a press release issued by the NGC, Dangriga.)
The Belizean Poets SocietyLearn more at: www.freewebs.com/belizeanpoetssocietyON POETIC FORMSTRIOLET...
A triolet has 8 lines, and two rhymes denoted here as “a” and “b”. The poem has a fixed form: ABaAabAB. The first line is repeated three times and the second line twice – denoted as upper case letters. The 1st, 4th and the 7th lines are identical and so are the 2nd and the 8th. The initial and final couplets (two lines) are identical.
Triolets are sometimes written in iambic tetrameter. (Find out about this in next issue of Belly Full.)
Belly Full example: Liberating
© Black Orchid
GLOSSARY TERMS:
OXYMORON: a combination of two words that appear to contradict each other. A paradox reduced to two words, usually in an adjective-noun or adverb-adjective combination. Oxymoron is also an oxymoron: it is derived from Greek roots: oxy ("sharp") and moros ("dull" or "dumb" ).
Examples: “bittersweet”… “deafening silence”… “wise fool”… “walking dead”…“same difference”…“pretty ugly”… “deliberate mistake”… “free prisoner”
ONOMATOPOEIA: the use of words to imitate the sounds they describe
Examples: “buzz”…“crack”…“whir”…“meow”…“hiss”…“pop”…“screech”…“fizz”
Gigolo (sweet man)
© Leonora Flowers
You are the man my mother warned me about
You are sweet and cute
Sexy and tough
Your eyes caress my soul
With each sheepish glance we stole
I see you at each corner
I can define each contour
Of muscled spine under soft cotton
I feel your uneven breath
On the nape of my neck
My heart and loins quicken with
Each measured step you take
I walk on pins and needles
When you are around
My heart ache
My chest burns with thoughts of you
Alone in the quiet of the night
I let my demons out
They control me, they torment me
They bring you near me
Tomorrow! For sure I say I will approach you
Tomorrow! For sure you will know how I yearn for you
Tomorrow! For sure I will be placated
Tomorrow I will kiss you, taste you, and caress you,
But tomorrow never comes
Is it because my pride is greater that my yearning for you?
My journey has been a long hard one
I want to trust you
But I have little faith
I smile at your lustful eyes
Looking into mine they radiate,
I have heard it all before
He said, they said, they all said
I will do this, I’ll do that,
We will do this, we will do that
I will give you this and I will give you that
My journey has been a long and hard one
I am tired, I’m weak but I must be strong
“It is a painful experience when you trot your masterpiece and it falls flat on its face”
- Therese Young Belisle
ON POETRY: Belizean poet, Therese, writes
I was first inspired to write in high school by having to study poets and writers such as Rudyard Kipling, Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe, Wordsworth, and many others that I came across throughout my four years there. I first had dreams of becoming an author (and may still) but reality intervened in the form of marriage and children and a busy, cluttered life, but a happy one nonetheless. When I started writing it was mostly short stories and some “verse” which were of the “Roses are red, violets are blue” variety. I didn’t write for many years after leaving high school, and remember clearly the first meaningful poem that I wrote. It was after the death of one of my babies, as a memorial to her. Since then I have only occasionally dedicated any time to writing throughout the past years. Writing takes time, which is a precious commodity when you’re running around with children.
I was lucky in having a friend introduce me to the Belize Poets Web Group and reading all the exciting poetry there. This is what has really kept me motivated to write throughout this past year. I guess it’s the feeling and awareness of “belonging” and being able to share with others whom you know can appreciate the efforts and emotions for what they are.
An outward expression of a very private self, struggling to come to terms with life, with family and friends, love and tragedy; a sharing of delightful situations, or wild imaginings, fact or fiction, poetry of movement, of a bird’s soaring or a tiger’s prowl, a rippling wave hit just right by the sunlight, a drooling chin of a giggling baby, or the long, gnarled fingers of a hard-working parent…their tired eyes overflowing with love…that is poetry.
No Validation Necessary!
Philip White
There once was a boy from lower East Kingston
Who every single day would create lovely songs
For his mother and father,
Sister and brother and then some
But none would pay him any mind, how come?
They said of talent he had none
And every chance they had
They gave his songs bad descriptions
And of him had horrible impressions
Though the boy went on composing his songs
And would always say to his family
“One day I’ll make a number one.”
They laughed in his face
And discouraged his every plan
What they threw at this 5 year old
Many times was sand in his face
From their taunting, wrinkled prune hands
They said, “Why don’t you stop your foolishness
Better you become a garbage man,
Teacha, lawya, docta or even politician
But wait, wha we seh
Him no have no ambition.
Stupid washbelly bwoy
Why him caan understand
Betta we jus lef him inna
One home full up a pure mad man
Cause you bwoy naw go no wheh
With you silly compositions.”
5 years old and the boy made a stand
He said, “I don’t need your validation
One day you see
I will have many number ones
And your harsh criticism of me
Will result in nada, none.”
Wow, such precocious determination
And at 5 years old a vocabulary far beyond…
But Momma and Papa couldn’t see
The genius in their son
All they could say was that
He was rude, feisty, outa order
And thirsty in his ambition
They called him, “Fledgling, DJ pariah bum”
Until he was 21
And laughed him to scorn, to scorn, to scorn
No pardon without exception.
Still this son continued to pursue his goals
And by 22
He had a number one that sold
Four million copies worldwide round the globe
Platinum that’s much more than gold
The boy never even said to his family
I told you so
When he continued to grow
On spinach calaloo, avocado plus mango
While they all ate healthy servings of Johncrow
Moral of the story
Don’t deprecate who you don’t know.
Jamaica will have success this year
Believe it, make it and be bold
The Caribbean will not settle for less this year
Up you mighty souls.
Yes we on a mission
Can’t block dis vision
Naw stop dis progress
With yu mental obstruction
Wha dem a try
Wha dem a profess
Al wha dem a try
We no get ban yet.
Ask me why I do this
And I’ll say this is how I give back
Ask me why I don’t do something else
And I’ll tell you what you lack
This is my time now
I don’t know how long this will go on
But while it’s here
I will share this inspiration.
The Belizean Poets Web Group
Membership as of July 2006: 76
You can become a member for free.
Share your poems, discuss with fellow poets, receive regular updates from group, and more...
See the link: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/belizeanpoets
Voice of the Totem
© Ritamae Hyde
An inhabited land
A resident population
That is what YOU discovered
Cultivators of land
Permanent towns
That is what YOU discovered
YOU discovered your supremacy
And preeminent rights
Whilst declaring lies of
An uninhabited land
With a nomadic population
How great a treachery?
Doctrine of discovery
Rights of conquest
Barren Wilderness
Wandering occupants
A frail native population
All provides moral and legal basis
For YOUR territorial conquest
In conquest YOU discovered
How to deceive
How to steal
How to displace
How to create falsehoods
How to recreate history
And make the eagle YOURS
People of the Eternal Spirit of the sky
People of the red land and red sun
Where justice is dead in the White-eye
Can you not hear the Totem cry?
The Totem longs
For justice
The Totem longs
To be resurrected
How to Read a Poem: Six Suggestions for Mollifying the Old Malady, “a poem can mean anything you want it to mean”
This series of four essays offers six suggestions to help the timid read a poem. The starting point is realizing that words in a poem still retain their meaning, but sometimes they take on additional meaning. This series shows you how.
If you believe a poem can mean anything you want it to mean, let's talk.
Let's start with a poem:
Marks by Linda Pastan
My husband gives me an A
for last night's supper,
an incomplete for my ironing,
a B plus in bed.
My son says I am average,
an average mother, but if
I put my mind to it
I could improve.
My daughter believes
in Pass/Fail and tells me
I pass. Wait 'til they learn
I'm dropping out.
Okay, based on the theory that a poem can mean anything you want it to mean, I offer the following claim for the meaning of this poem:
This poems means that death is part of all our lives, and we should learn to accept it. In the poem "Marks" stands for people. Some of us are A's, some of us are B+'s, some of us are average, some pass, and some fail. The speaker of the poem is a gay male, and his husband has just died. He "dropped out" -- because he wasn't happy with the speaker leaving the ironing "incomplete." He probably needed his shirt, and it wasn't ironed, so he had to wear it wrinkled. The speaker of the poem believes that his children are weird for calling him mother, so he decided to commit suicide too; we know this, because he says in the last line, "I'm dropping out." But all of this could have been avoided if they had realized that death is part of life, and we must learn to accept it.
Now compare this claim about meaning to the following:
In the poem "Marks" the speaker is using a school metaphor to vent her frustration at being constantly evaluated by her family. "Marks" means grades, and each family member has his or her own system of grading the mother: the husband uses letter grades, giving his wife an "A / for last night's supper." She gets and "I"--incomplete--for ironing, because no doubt she didn't finish and probably left some of his clothes unironed. All of the grades are good grades, except for the ironing, but then an incomplete can be converted to an "A" as soon as the work is finished. The son is less discriminating than the husband; he just claims his mom is average, but he also thinks she has potential to become above average "if / [she puts her] mind to it." The daughter uses the pass/fail system, and the good news is the mother passes.
The mother, though, is somewhat perturbed by all this grading; after all running a household is not school, so stop all this evaluating, for goodness sakes, and so she says, "Wait 'til they learn / I'm dropping out." Keeping the school metaphor, she employs the verbs "learn" and "dropping out." Now the question is, what does the mother mean by saying she's dropping out? Does she mean she's leaving the household, divorcing the husband, abandoning the children? Does she mean she's going to commit suicide? I suggest that these measures are too drastic. The situation is not that ominous. After all, her "marks" are really good ones: A, B+, I (which can be replaced with an A); average, with the potential to be above average; and pass. The family is not negatively marking her. Why would she be motivated to abandon the family or commit suicide for getting such good marks? I suggest that her "dropping out" is a mild exaggeration and probably indicates that she is no longer going to care if they evaluate her. She's dropping out of the school metaphor; she will no longer consider herself open to evaluation. The poem is too playful to allow for the dire interpretation of family abandonment and suicide. The school metaphor makes it playful. In order to hint at abandonment or suicide I would argue that a speaker might use a legal metaphor, claim that she had been judged wrongly, imply that she was committed to prison unjustly; then the speaker might imply family abandonment or suicide.
Now which claim makes more sense?
The Nonsense Claim for Pastan’s Poem
It should be obvious that the first claim is preposterous, and I'll concede that in formulating it, I have exaggerated, but only a little. When I taught English composition at Ball State University, students often turned in essays that were similar to that erroneous reading. And many students coming into my classes brought the notion that "a poem can mean anything you want it to mean." The notion is widespread. Walking to the library one day, I overheard a heated conversation between a young woman and her companion. I heard her say distinctly: "But I write poetry, and poetry doesn't have to make sense." What is the point of writing anything that doesn't make sense? Words have meanings, and whether or not you choose to acknowledge their meanings, they still have them. When you say the word "sun," those who know that word will think of the big star that warms the Earth. They will not think of chocolate, socks, or death. Their first thought is the object that the word "sun" is designated to "mean."
There is no problem with this understanding until we encounter that word (or any word) in a poem. Many students have inferred from their early encounters with poetry that words in poems never retain their real-life, prose meaning. So "sun" in a poem does not ever mean that big star that warms our planet; it will mean something different and only the teacher knows what it is. Even as they believe it, students balk at the notion that only the teacher has the answer and therefore come away with the idea that since words always mean something different in poems, they must mean anything you want them to mean.
I have had students tell me that they never got the same thing out of a poem that the teacher did. And the students think they were always wrong, and the teacher was always right. This situation makes no sense to the student, and so in self-defense, they come away with the idea that "a poem can mean anything you want it to mean." At least that gives the students some self-esteem; it's better than believing that only the teacher has an answer, and the student will forever remain clueless about finding the answer.
But what is the answer? Why do poems present such a problem? Do words never retain their denotative meaning in poems? The solution to this problem is really a simple one. But it has become complex through a series of misunderstandings. How can we clear away these misunderstandings?
Let's look at another poem:
Morning Song by Sylvia Plath
Love set you going like a fat gold watch.
The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry
Took its place among the elements.
Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.
In a drafty museum, your nakedness
Shadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.
I'm no more your mother
Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow
Effacement at the wind's hand.
All night your moth-breath
Flickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:
A far sea moves in my ear.
One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral
In my Victorian nightgown.
Your mouth opens clean as a cat's. The window square
Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you try
Your handful of notes;
The clear vowels rise like balloons.
Suggestions for Reading a Poem 1 – 3
As we study Plath's "Morning Song," let's keep in mind the following suggestions:
1. Words in a poem still retain their meaning: love=love, statue=statue, balloons=balloons.
2. Words in a poem may also take on additional meaning:
"Love set you going like a fat, gold watch."
"Love" here implies "conception of the child," as well as the emotional and sexual attraction that drew the parents together in the act that resulted in the "conception" of the child.
"Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.
"In a drafty museum . . ."
"Statue" here refers to the baby. According to the mother/speaker the baby is like a new statue in a museum.
"And now you try
Your handful of notes;
The clear vowels rise like balloons."
"Balloons" here refer to the baby's sounds. The sounds seem to move upward, light and airy and colorful.
3. Let's consider the following nutshell definition of a poem: A poem is an artistic representation of what it feels like to experience the emotional life of a human being. We human beings are not satisfied with prose when it comes to representing our emotions.
A prose rendering of the poem "Morning Song" would run something like this: I am supposedly your mother, I conceived you, gave birth to you, but somehow, even as I run to you and care for you, I feel that you are a stranger to me.
Notice how bland and unremarkable this rendering is. The artist/poet is moved to explore those basic feelings and share them in a more specific and colorful medium; therefore, instead of the prosaic claim, "I conceived you," the poet dramatizes by saying, "Love set you going like a fat, gold watch." Instead of saying, "I am supposedly your mother," the poet portrays that idea: "I'm no more your mother / Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow / Effacement at the wind's hand."
Instead of dully remarking, "I feel you are a stranger to me," the poet compares the baby to a new statue in a museum, and later states, "Your mouth opens clean as a cat's." Statues in museums are not intimate objects, and cats are universally noted to be independent creatures. So the point here is that as we are living this life and experiencing it, we react to it in unique ways; we each have our own attitudes toward experiences.
One mother might acknowledge only the closeness she feels for her child, while another stresses the distance she feels. That's where interpretation comes in, and that's also the place where students have been led astray. They ask me every semester, "Are we supposed to give you our own interpretation or the right one?" Again that idea that only the teacher knows the right interpretation, and now, if lucky, this teacher will let me state my own idea whether it is right or not.
4. This carries us into the difference between right and wrong interpretation. A poem has two levels of meaning, the surface level which includes the subject and event or simply what's going on in the poem; the deep meaning (sometimes inaccurately called "hidden meaning" by beginners) which includes the interpretation.
Interpretation results from the reader's discerning the implications of the surface level meaning. Confusing the two levels of meaning, the student settles for the notion that a poem can mean anything. It's one thing not to realize in the poem "Morning Song" that the speaker is a new mother speaking to her newborn baby, and not realizing that the mother seems to feel two ways about her baby.
And some students do not discern this elementary level of meaning; I have actually heard students claim that the speaker is a bird speaking to the sun, or a grandmother speaking to a grandchild. Of course, after a closer look, most students come to understand that truly the speaker is a mother speaking to her newborn. But others remain in a vague haze, continuing to believe that "if I want, I can still think it is a bird talking to the sun."
5. Your own life experience will affect your understanding of a poem. But it will affect the interpretation more than it should affect understanding surface meaning, if you have grasped the suggestions offered in 1-4.
Especially that the words still have their same meaning, although they may take on some additional meaning. Obviously, a woman who has given birth and experienced nurturing a newborn will interpret meaning from the Plath poem that an inexperienced woman or man may not. But the inexperienced young woman or man is still able to recognize a mother speaking to an infant. Take the line, "The midwife slapped your footsoles": why would a bird make such a remark to the sun? Would a bird listen to the sun's "moth-breath" all night? Imagine a bird claiming to be "cow-heavy and floral" in a Victorian night gown. Obviously, the recognition of such common images is not denied the inexperienced in childbirth. Only the inexperienced in poetry reading find these words and images baffling.
6. The purpose of poetry is not primarily to convey information. A poem requires a special reading, different from a newspaper article that you read quickly for the facts. A poem requires repeated readings/listenings. As does your favorite song. You don't listen to your favorite rock group to get the latest news. You listen to be transported by the music, to experience the emotion of the lyric, to be entertained by the drama. It's the same with poems. You read them to get back your emotional experience.
You have experienced profound pain in your life, and deep in your soul you remember what it was like, but you have probably not dramatized it. You discover the following poem, and you say to yourself, "Yes, that's the way it was. Yes, Emily Dickinson understood pain the same way I did, and she lived over a century ago, look at this, how universal my pain is." And you are suddenly bound up with art and the rest of humanity in ways you did not know existed. Please enjoy the following poem:
After great pain, a formal feeling comes --
The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs --
The stiff Heart questions was it He, that bore,
And Yesterday, or Centuries before?
The Feet, mechanical, go round --
Of Ground, or Air, or Ought --
A Wooden way
Regardless grown,
A Quartz contentment, like a stone --
This is the Hour of Lead --
Remembered, if outlived,
As Freezing persons, recollect the Snow --
First -- Chill -- then Stupor -- then the letting go --
If you still believe that a poem can mean anything you want it to, what do you want this one to mean?
This article was reproduced with permission from Linda Sue Grimes, the author. The piece appeared on the Poetry site, BellaOnline.com.
TRIVIA:
1. Innocence is Poetry is an anthology by… a) members of the Belizean Poets Society
b) Poets R Us members
c) Wesley College students
d) Placencia primary school students
e) Veteran Belizean poets
a) oxymoron
b) personification
c) alliteration
d) hyperbole
e) metonymy
3. Who is the author of the poem: Drums of My Fathers?
b) Marcella Lewis
c) E. Roy Cayetano
d) Clifford Palacio
e) Felene Cayetano
Here are the answers to last month’s trivia:
1. Who is the founder of The Ernest McPherson Poetry Club? Answer: Rita Sedacy
2. How many lines does a sonnet have? Answer: 14 lines
3. The poem Reality Check by Kenny Morgan is about? Answer: The murder of young girlsPlease sign the GUESTBOOK
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