Siobhan Harvey introduced the winner and the runners-up of the 2013 Emerging Poets Competition in an engaging session at Going West Literary Festival on Saturday. Anna Hodge (Auckland University Press)  judged the competition and the winners were announced and showcased at an event on New Zealand Poetry Day. The three poets were all different but shared an engaging simplicity that then revealed pleats and folds that moved you. Congratulations to the three poets.  I was delighted they gave me permission to post their winning poems.

On the winners, see here. I managed to get a photo of Jack Spicer at Going West but missed the others.

The winner:

Breakfast in Iraq:

 

the morning smells

of motorways and salt.

all the birds are

empty. last night

the journalist

fell asleep listening

to a woman retching

into a bucket.

 

somewhere a car bomb

has spat a million tacks

outside a supermarket.

a woman in a sun dress

sucks blood from the

henna of her hair.

 

it is after dawn but

no children sing

for pastry and milk.

a television plays

cartoons to the growing

crowd of umlauts

where eyes used to be.

 

© Elizabeth Morton 2013

 

 

 

The runners-up:

Before I go to bed

I play digga on dad’s computer.

When you leave the computer for a long time-

the screen changes.

it changes to stars that go past really really really fast.

I like to sit and look at it

and it feels like I’m in space.

One time I was looking for a really really really long time

and I thought something might happen at the end.

But nothing did.

Maybe this is what you see all the time

– when you’re dead?

Before I go to bed.

I ask mum- what happens when you die?

Mum said – don’t worry,

Cos you’re just a little boy

Now go to sleep

Sack of potatoes

It’s a new day tomorrow.

© Jack Spicer 2013

 

 

 

New moon

 

I can measure the time you’ve been away

by the small black moon rising.

 

That day I put your bags into the boot,

laid your vintage hat carefully on the back seat.

 

A little finger lingered where it shouldn’t have,

held back, stopped instead of pressing on.

 

I heard the dull thud of a door not quite closing

and knew some part of me was stuck.

 

Still we made it, little finger held up,

straight like a lady drinking tea,

 

all the way to the airport.

Snug with its plaster coat on,

 

ready for a colder climate half way across the world.

Only it wasn’t going with you.

 

It had to stay here with me, to heal,

and it has, just as you said it would.

 

And it didn’t loose its nail after all –

it’s been strong, holding on,

 

though it swelled and missed you terribly.

 

© Rosetta Allan 2010