Last year I was invited to share one of my poems on Un poema cada semana (A poem a week) by the philosophy teacher Antonio Martín who encourages his students to think critically about, and find inspiration in, poetry. He also shares my interest in poetry film and was keen to collaborate so we set up a project for students at López de Arenas Secondary School, Marchena, Seville, Spain, to make ‘word films’. From these, I chose the five words for this year’s competition: broken, reflection, disappear, path and paint.
In the class plan for teachers this year I included an invitation for students to make ‘word films’, and as well as receiving a record 220 poems I have received a wonderful collection of ‘word films’ from pupils at Te Parito Kōwhai Russley School in Christchurch. They had a lot of fun making them and were also excited about the poems they wrote travelling all the way to Spain! There is still plenty of time (until the end of November 2023) to send in your word films, which could be chosen for next year’s Given Words. With the ubiquity of mobile phones and free video-editing apps, it is easy to make word films, and maybe we´ll inspire young poets to start turning their poems into poetry films as well… For details of how to participate see: EXTRA ACTIVITY — ‘WORD FILMS’
And for those of you interested in how poetry and film can work together, the inaugural Aotearoa Poetry Film Festival will take place on 2–3 November in Wellington and showcase the diversity of poetry film produced both in Aotearoa New Zealand and overseas. I feel very lucky to have been invited to participate on the festival jury, so hopefully I'll see you there!
Returning to your poems, we have enjoyed reading all 220 of them and have chosen 49 to publish here on Given Words. The winning poems have been selected by Mikaela Nyman, Sophia Wilson and myself, Charles Olsen. (You can read about us here.)
Charles comments on behalf of the judges: It always surprises me how the poems we receive are so varied. Art and artists, sparrows, funerals, illness, inner searching, memories of Granada and Mediterranean skies, family history, neighbours, play… The same five words appear in all of them, but seem chosen for each poem.
I’m very grateful to Mikaela Nyman and Sophia Wilson for their reflections and insights into each poem. I will highlight below some of our reactions to the poems, but you might like to scroll down first to the winning poems and read the poems from adults here and by under-16s here before returning to compare notes.
Beginning with the adults category I particularly enjoyed the poem On Sparrows, which takes a drab everyday bird and through comparisons with desolate imagery subtly turns them into beings of inner beauty as ‘they swirl like litter in the streets’. Mikaela noted how it ‘captures our cityscapes, full of concrete and imported grey birds with fabulous lines like “the grey concrete notes of a brutalist birdsong”’.
Salisbury Park also caught our attention. Mikaela describes it as ‘a tight poem packed with emotion about the death of an innocent baby, hinting at potential foul play and letting the socioeconomic divide seep in. There seem to be gang members in this gathering that stands “grief-knotted on the path”’.
Nana’s Garden intrigued me. I love how four of the five words are strung together with ‘plashets on the path, paint broken reflections’. The description of the ‘turtle woman’, ‘her lacquered back’ and the ‘shattered shell’ provide clues but in the end we don’t know who the ‘shattered shell’ belonged to, the poet/grandchild, the mother, or Nana herself? The story seems a simple one about Nana’s garden but it leaves a sense of tragedy with feet on different paths but also reflects on the special relationship that can grow between grandparents and grandchildren.
The Asylum for Lost Words opens with great lines that took me into a child’s way of looking. The poet/parent ‘assemble[s] salads from sticks’ and reflects on ‘unravelled childhood memories’. It takes us inside the playfulness and fantasy of childhood and on into a place where ‘borrowed memories slide in through cracks’ and objects detach from their names and break into separate consonants. Is this a sideways look at childhood and the way we build language through play and fantasy, building and discarding as we go? Or is it a darker reflection on the memories that carry into our adult lives? Sophia described it as ‘a thoughtful poem about the interrelationship between language, memory and identity’.
When we read the Under-16s poems we know how old each writer is, but with the adults poems we don’t, so it is often a nice surprise to find younger writers stand out in the adults category, like the writer of The Search who is 17. Mikaela said ‘I love the sense of mystery this poem evokes and the slant rhymes. Clearly, it’s not merely the pet lambs that are missing.’ Sophia describes how ‘the narrative shifts back and forth between the poet’s microcosm of grief and the unfathomable breadth of space in which they grasp impossibly for what is lost’.
We were all captivated by My Mother, Deciduous. It is full of magical metaphor. Sophia described it as ‘a beautifully written poem, in which “the sun that warmed” and “the moon that / painted possums in...branches” give way to a “slab slate sky” and “broken memories / [that] clutter downpipes and gutters”. Encroaching cold and shortening days convey a world closing down. The final line of the poem suggests sudden and unpredictable loss and is particularly moving.’
And finally we settled on the poem transmutations. Sophia described it as ‘a compelling poem in which the poet engages with narcissus who is both a “fantasy” and as real as their own “stranded self”. The poem’s landscape is one of “bloated secrets of corvine consequence” and birds who consult among “glyphs of pines” and a body that grows “spurs / & a ring of teeth like a lamprey” The title and the deftness with which the poem shapeshifts in imagery and form perfectly reflects the narrative of broken and rippling transformation’. Mikaela commented ‘the poem sits beautifully on the page. The city is brought to life as a character in its own right, wet and with a lap full of stagnant water, “swallowing itself—deep throating its darker desires”’, and she also highlighted the examination ‘of the poet’s broken self as he/she “skulks through the undergrowth” and grows “a ring of teeth like a lamprey”’. The striking images are accompanied by a lovely feeling for sound and rhythm, which move side to side like ‘the agitation of water’ or waft in ‘a twist of white smoke’.
Turning to the poems by under-16s, the mathematical poem Non-Euclidean Geometry caught our attention with its playful use of the words. Sophia commented ‘This poem immediately caught my attention with its clever use of ABC, its play on mathematical concepts and its multilayered meaning. It had a mathematical sparseness that was both clean and effective. An excellent and original effort’.
I particularly liked the simplicity of Broken Reflections and how it creates a beautiful image with its original way of looking and listening ‘the sound of the waves/as they calmly crawl up the sand’, how the sun becomes ‘a broken reflection/in the endless sea’ and the final path is one of the most original, the ‘orange beams’ … ‘a path to nowhere.’
The young writer (aged 9) of Snow was one of the few to use words in te reo Māori. Mikaela highlighted poetic lines of this 'beautifully crafted' poem such as ‘Snow paints the mountain/the colour of kōtuku’. Also by a young writer (aged 7), Dear Grandma is wonderfully constructed around the five words and has a particularly moving message.
With the word reflection many poets took the mirror’s reflection as their theme. One that stood out for its originality was A Shadow Is Not A Reflection. ‘An insightful poem that speaks through metaphors of mirrors, reflections and boundaries,’ says Sophia, ‘“Gentle blush” on one side of a wall contrasts with “painted blood” on the other, highlighting the discrepancy between the poet’s internal world and external appearances’.
We enjoy poems that create a scene and tell a story. Sparks Fly is very visual in its description of a ‘lonely town’. Mikaela highlights how the poem ‘evokes a mood of gloom and doom. This really is a godforsaken town where “flames lick at the peeling paint of the worn houses,/eating the rotting wood like a hungry animal”. It’s eerie, no one seems to live there, only a poor dog is left behind’.
It is also fun reading poems that take us to far away places. Sophia commented on Dear Traveler ‘I really enjoyed the confident liveliness of this poem that imaginatively transports the reader on a journey. There is a wistful poignancy in the final line “I always wanted to see the world”’.
In the end we chose the poem The Broken School. It is concise and has fun with the words, with each idea underlined by the use of rhyming couplets. Mikaela comments on this ‘gutsy sociopolitical commentary on the New Zealand education system. A scathing view from the inside by a student who’s unafraid and unapologetic, even though they still have many years to go before they’re allowed to exit the system’. She highlighted its ‘assured voice and delivery’ adding, ‘I can’t wait to see where this writer will go next’. The underlying humour of the poem forms a nice contrast with the darkness of the theme and the final stanza underscores the poet's dark vision of the broken school.
We are very grateful to all who participated, ngā mihi ki a koutou. We love taking time with each poem and feel privileged you have shared your poems with us. As Sophia says, 'there were so many terrific entries this year—poems that prompted tears, laughter or thrilled with their freshness and roar.' Especially in the under-16s category, we try find a balance between the ages (from 5 to 15 this year!) and although your poem may not have been selected this year we encourage you to keep writing and having fun with words!
We are delighted to announce the winning poets. The winner of Best Poem is Elliot Harley McKenzie for their poem transmutations and the winner of Best Poem by Under-16s is Boh Harris for his poem The Broken School. This edition we would also like to award a Special Mention to Tim Saunders for his poem My Mother, Deciduous. The winners receive books courtesy of The Cuba Press and Massey University Press. Congratulations to all on behalf of Given Words, The Cuba Press and Massey University Press.
Below are the winning poems and Special Mention. We also invite you to read our selection of the rest of the poems from adults here and from under-16s here. All entries had to include the following five words: broken, reflection, disappear, path, and paint.
transmutations
narcissus, would you lie with me
hold my hand in yours, unknotting
your animal posturing—
the lover’s softness discomposed
by sorrow
with bloated secrets of corvine consequence
birds consult among the glyphs of pines
while i contemplate the woodstack & skulk through the undergrowth
phlegmatic temperaments turn savagely to choleric
i shuck my body, grow spurs
& a ring of teeth like a lamprey
its darker desires, the soft lap of stagnant water rustles
in the overhanging branches
the plane’s thundering path
houses a wet paint smudge
on the hillside
my signal flickers
a cold block of shadow
a glimmer sliding through, soon to disappear
the room rocks in a vibrant cascade
crashing towards a pounding future
the agitation of water—a body of stretched new snow
a new world of desire germinating
until it roots so concrete
narcissus gazes at their own broken
& rippling reflection
a stranded self wafts up in a twist of white smoke
its plaintive self-interest so blatant
beneath the lights.
Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland
The Broken School
At lunch not a word is allowed to be spoken.
I think our whole school system is broken.
There are no mirrors to see our reflections.
So it's hard to fix our imperfections.
Every day a teacher disappears.
Is it from theft or out of despair?
There’s not enough money for paper or paths.
Nobody smiles and nobody laughs.
You won't see a wall that's not chipped.
Even the paint is trashed and ripped.
Every day I endure this stuff,
yet my parents don’t think I've had enough.
Ōtautahi Christchurch
My Mother, Deciduous
My mother, deciduous,
tries to recall the breeze
she never saw,
the sun that warmed her,
and the moon that
painted possums in her branches.
She clasps sunlight
and the long-abandoned nests
of birds in fingers
exposed to elements,
naked to the touch,
while wild reflections of us
speckle the path below her
in patches
gently rustling.
She reaches bare hands
to a slab slate sky
like a stone angel
quietly beseeching eternity.
Broken memories scatter,
clutter downpipes and gutters,
reveal secrets and words unspoken.
My mother, deciduous.
As the days noticeably shorten
and become decidedly colder,
the possums disappear
one-by-one
without warning.
Palmerston North
About the Poets
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