First Place

Too Many Books

By Howard Paine

There are too many books to read,
too many words to cram into my brain
causing me pain
driving me irresponsible.

Read three books last week and cannot remember
what they were about
only that I enjoyed them.

I hate television, though I watch it most nights.
Maybe that is why I hate it, because it carries such a
high price.

We exist only for such a short period,
a single grain of rice
in all the world,
yet we eagerly exchange it for things which do nothing
but pass the time.

I catch myself talking without saying anything.
“Stop it,” I yell in my head.
Even worse I get caught by a blowhard
telling me his worries and how the next election will decide the fate of America

“I don’t care,” I want to say. I just want to go.
He pulls me closer, smiles and continues on about the evils
of the world and what he learned to parrot from talk radio as if
they were his words and opinions.

Songs from my childhood play in my head
rhymes and stories I haven’t thought about in so very long
I want to create new memories
but loneliness has its price
and loneliness comes from within

What should I talk about, listen to, read, watch? Who should I be with,
hold, need?
I hear nothing but the clicking of a clock in the dining room and the sputtering
of the refrigerator.

Second Place

To Paint A Secret

by Bruce Cleman

I like to paint,
to splash canvases with color,
to create something from fog;
turn it to reality. At least my version of reality.
Which isn’t the same as everyone else’s.

I know this, because, most if not all,
never get what it is that I paint.
“Is that a house on a riverbank?”
or “a duck on a wave?”
they ask.
I smile and nod and say they are correct
because I need the sell,
to buy the pasta and corn and rent and always something for the baby.

I like my paintings the best because at least I know
what the hell the damn painter was attempting to get at.
A secret I get to share with no one.
At night I spend time alone just staring at my paintings
thinking just how grand they really are
and how sad I am to have to sell them.

Third Place

The Outer Banks June 2015

by Jackie Carson

Waves break
pushing dead things to shore
like crabs with five legs and fish without eyes
and sometimes somethings larger
a whale beached here 40 some years ago
today its just ancient shells worn to smooth lumps and
scattered drift wood
perhaps from sunken pirate ships
a young woman dressed in black
wears a red hat with a white band
it is caught in the wind and sent to sea
she asks a tall thin boy to fetch it
the boy shakes his head and walks away
before the woman can protest
perhaps he is afraid of the water
or is late for something,
but the boy saunters off and later swims laughing on the waves