Mother*

2022 Merit Award
By Rusty Bower

The sun emanates confounding energy
Unconditional radiation for the duration of its time

It bears perpetual fusion and electromagnetic rupture
yet remains the singular source of luminance and life

while the earth remains among its star it is nurtured
Bonded by immense gravity

Through millennia or a moment
Evolution and complexity arise

So
I suppose mother
You are like the sun

*Copyright © 2022 by Rusty Bower. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Poet’s bio: Rusty Bower is 17 years old and in the eleventh grade at Sehome High School in Bellingham. This is Rusty’s first poem, completed for a project in creative writing class for Mother’s Day. “The poem is about how much my mom does for me despite her struggles.”

NOTE: a chapbook of the 2022 Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest winning poems, including this one, is available at Village Books in Bellingham. All sales profits benefit the annual contest.

After the Flood*

2022 Walk Award
By Leslie Wharton

Finally clean
she still smells mud       so moves to higher ground
the one picture of her papa       dries rippled

tears pool       stranded salmon spawn       in fields
time divides into       before and after       but never

ever after       she stockpiles food        up high
gathers kindness       counts her blessings

watches weather       longs to love the river again
bogged down       by newly formed tenderness

she can no longer       sweep spiderwebs       shoo flickers
she gently       places       shells       back to sea

by summer       she’ll return       to the Nooksack
where gravel bars wash away       new beds rest

beneath the highwater mark       exposed sapling roots
hold fast       in undercurrents of fear       hope floats

*Copyright © 2022 by Leslie Wharton. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Poet’s bio:
Leslie Wharton works as a caregiver for the elderly, who inspire and listen to her poetry. Her efforts to share poetry with a broader community include gathering poets for a Dress Poetry Show at Allied Arts Gallery, the Bellingham Women’s March, and other public events. Colorful broadside posters of Leslie’s poems are available for display in restaurants and galleries. Her first poetry collection, She Votes, was published in late 2022. “This poem started as an exploration of hope and then became a poem about our community’s recent flood.” When Leslie decided to donate her Walk Award plaque to the Sumas Library, she discovered, sadly, that the library was destroyed in November’s flood. Having lost her home to wildfire, she understands how disaster changes a survivor.

Cats*

2022 Walk Award
By Hayley Van Ness

Crazy cute creative creatures
Are awesome active acrobats
Tiny tame tigers
Sneaky sly silly stretchers

*Copyright © 2022 by Hayley Van Ness. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Poet’s bio:
Hayley Van Ness is 8 years old and likes cats. She has two of them!

NOTE: a chapbook of the 2022 Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest winning poems, including this one, is available at Village Books in Bellingham. All sales profits benefit the annual contest.

words from a cloud*

2022 Walk Award
By Matthew Stuckey

“…all the flowers are forms of water.
the sun reminds them through a white cloud…”
W.S. Merwin

you think my body is light
as air but I am
the weight of water
heavy as stones
above your head

I am water that
moves in oceans above you
I am a form of river and
ancient glacier shining

the pink cherry blossoms are
also forms of water
the egret in the light
an old tortoise hiding

and in the night
your words of despair as well

*Copyright © 2022 by Matthew Stuckey. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Poet’s bio:
Matthew Stuckey lives with his wonderful wife in Bellingham, Washington, where he practices acupuncture and wanders around in the mountains. This is his first published poem and will hopefully not be his last. The cloudy PNW and W.S. Merwin’s poem “Rain Light” inspired the poem “words from a cloud.”

NOTE: a chapbook of the 2022 Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest winning poems, including this one, is available at Village Books in Bellingham. All sales profits benefit the annual contest.

Give me your hand*

2022 Walk Award
By Amanda Norenberg

I am a bridge
Between you, child, and those who you feel
but will never meet in the flesh.

I am not made of taut cables and steel, or wood
and bolts and cross-beams, or even tight ropes
woven together. I am not hard or immobile.

I am made of a glance, a giggle, a sigh, a wrinkle,
a skin spot, a black eyelash, a squinty grin.

I am made of rigatoni noodles steaming out of
the pot coated in butter, given to you in a small
bowl with a wink before dinner.

I am lasagna oozing mozzarella and red grease,
I am endive coated in sour vinegar and olive oil,
I am stories repeated around the table.

How can you be a bridge AND be all these
other things? you ask.

Babe, the bridge IS all these things,
and the bridge is your hand in my hand in
all their hands, all at once.

*Copyright © 2022 by Amanda Norenberg. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Poet’s bio:
Amanda Norenberg grew up in Minnesota on the North Shore of Lake Superior for 23 years, and has now lived in Washington the exact same amount of time. With a background in language (English, French, Chinese) and art, she’s had articles, poems, and photos published, art shows exhibited, and is now focusing these passions into a self-owned copywriting and photography business called Facet Copy. Amanda’s close relationship with her 11-year-old daughter is an inspiration for this poem. “Remembering the generation of grandparents I grew up with, I was mourning the fact that Opal will never meet them. But I realized that through me and the traditions we keep as a family, they can still feel alive in her heart.”

looking back, looking forward

As you may know, in addition to being an independent site focused on all-things-poetry in Cascadia, and sometimes beyond, The Poetry Department began, and continues to serve, as the public platform for the annual Sue C. Boynton Poetry Contest. That entails announcing events and deadlines, posting guidelines, and each year, posting the winning poems and the artful placards that display them.

The contest is exceedingly grateful to judges Victor Ortiz and Dayna Patterson, who selected the winning poems, and to the four artists who applied their considerable talents to illustrate the placards: Angela Boyle, Megan Carroll, Kimberly Wulfestieg, and Christian Anne Smith.

Tomorrow, Sunday, December 11, 2022, and each of the next 24 Sundays, the text of one of the winning poems will be displayed along with the placard and a brief bio of the poet. Each poem will be linked on the Winners page once it has appeared here.

The Sue Boynton Poetry Contest is a wonderful Whatcom County community project that is run entirely by volunteers. If you care about community poetry and have a few hours available to help, the contest committee is in need of an infusion of new volunteers for a variety of tasks. Please contact Joan Packer at torchlite AT yahoo.com or phone (360) 714-1306.

The Leaf*

2021 Walk Award
by Noa Shelsta, 3rd grade

It is spring
I poke my head out of my branch
And yawn

And now it is summer
I fold my arms out of my cozy bed
I spread my arms to tickle the wind
And then I yawn and fold my arms
Back down again

And then before I know it
It is fall
I stretch my arms
That have turned into wings
And lift into the air
And flutter to the ground

Then it is cold winter
I huddle in the earth with the other leaves
Until next spring

*Copyright © 2021 by Noa Shelsta. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Low Down in the Blues*

2021 Walk Award
by Janette Lyn Rosebrook

A humpback breaches,
exposes the long pale accordion of its belly,
and splashes down.

A companion follows,
barnacle-starred flukes fan and slap
across the surface.

Listen for nocturne and solos,
some so low down in the blues
you cannot hear them.

A silvery calf
arches and spirals around its mother
like a dervish.

With whirling songs
the humpback trio turns and fades
into the depths.

The divers surface,
into the silent coda that follows
the passing of friends.

*Copyright © 2021 by Janette Lyn Rosebrook. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Poet’s bio:
Janette Rosebrook is a lifelong resident of the Pacific Northwest, where she spent long childhood days in the woods, eating salmonberries and redcaps, and muddying up her good shoes in search of frogs. She earned an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia in 2019 and currently works at Western Washington University. Her work has appeared in Cirque: A Literary Journal of the North Pacific Rim, Washington 129, and Solstice: Light and Dark of the Salish Sea.

“I started writing ‘Low Down in the Blues’ during the 2020 Poetry Marathon, an annual event founded by former Bellingham residents, Caitlin and Jacob Jans. I was inspired to finish the poem after good friends shared their incredible underwater photographs of a humpback whale family they encountered during a sailing trip. I was honored to read the poem at a memorial service for one of those friends. It was written in remembrance of my dear friend Bruce.”

Virus mourning*

2021 Walk Award
by Timothy Pilgrim

I resolved to cease grieving
once every trace of her was gone.

I donated hats, scarves, skirts, coats,
stowed her perfume, rings, Kindle,

phone. All spring, gathered strands
of hair from sofa, afghan,

chairs, placed each beside her urn.
My plan — heal during summer,

bury everything deep beneath aster,
cosmos, rose. Watch their blossoms

sway final farewell in wind —
until fall, when frost took hold.

But as the winter dark set in,
I stumbled upon her cache.

Vinyl gloves, goggles, masks
breathed my grief to light again.

*Copyright © 2021 by Timothy Pilgrim. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.

Poet’s bio:
Timothy Pilgrim’s life-story booklet in sixth grade included his first poem, and since then, over 500 others poems have been accepted by more than 100 different publications. A native of Montana and resident of the Pacific Northwest for all but two years of his life, he loves to garden, hike and snowshoe with his wife, the novelist and former WWU professor, Carolyn Dale. He taught journalism at WWU from 1992 until he retired in 2013 and has published two books of poetry (the latest, Seduced by metaphor: Timothy Pilgrim collected published poems, published in 2021).

“Virus mourning” emerged from a shower of grief — including a long bout over suffering and death of so many during this Covid plague and then the death of his 93-year-old mother-in-law in mid-March. “I’d held it in, and months passed without us being able to visit until shortly before she died a few weeks ago. Then the grieving piqued, and my imagination served up this poetic manifestation.”

Closure*

2021 Merit Award
by Arden Haines

Walking down the driveway — it was sunny that day —
To the orchard one last time.
I touched the apple and pear branches
Whose fruit, now asleep, I would never see
Then in the vineyard by reflex
Tweaking a branch here or there
Thinking about the years of pruning.
These trees and vines did not exist before me
But they will be here after me.
I walked up the barn stairs to the upper level
Viewed Mt Baker out the double doors
Where I sat on the edge surveying the farm.
A farmer’s life is a cycle of seasons
Each one has its list of tasks
This week is tilling; then is seeding;
Then the long patient days
Of summer weeding
Harvest comes and the
Putting up of stores for winter.
I lost my farm one July day
Just after using up the last quart of tomatoes.
You can steal a farm
But you can’t remove the farmer’s hand
Who grew it up and loved its vines and
Branches into being.

*Copyright © 2021 by Arden Haines. Broadside illustrated by Kimberly Wulfestieg.