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Reuben
Rose 17th. International Competition 2006
Winners & Honorable Mentions (Please
note- since all poems are judged anonymously, it may happen that a poet may
appear twice in the list- as happened this year!) POEMS
are in full below-Click on Names for the link
Judge: Vera
Rich, London, UK
1st.
Prize: Ruth Fogelman-Rachel's Eulogy for
her Grandmother
2nd. Prize: Lara Kwalbrun-Memoirs of a Leper
3rd. Prize: JohnMichael Simon-After the War
4th. Prize: David Silverman- How
Cupid Saved My Marriage
Honorary
Mentions (In reverse alphabetical order only):
Toni
Tyler - Hurry
Elleraine Lockie - The Best Revenge
Fay Lipshitz
- Hagar|
Fay Lipshitz
-
Judean Desert
Lara Kwalbrun - A Hidden Face
Ricky Friesem - Breasts
Ruth Fogelman - Hanging rainbows
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Reuben Rose International Competition,
2006
1st. Prize: Ruth
Fogelman, : Rachel's Eulogy
for her Grandmother
Grandma,
how I miss you! I sat at your knee
telling you my dreams. You
smiled and nodded knowingly,
singing
of a land where summer grass is topped with dew -
ญyou read me Aunt Rivka's scrolls
from the land where date palms brush the sky. You knew
I
loved your lullabies of young men whose souls
soared to heaven as they sat learning in a tent,
and your stories how Uncle dug wells - deep holes - ญ
from
which water surged, and oases bloomed, and how Aunt went
and fell off her camel when she saw
Uncle, like an angel, praying in a field. You spent
hours
with me as I played with new lambs near the tent door!
And you consoled me when Leah married the man
I loved. You too will have him, a little patience, dear, you said before
the
morning star appeared. You persuaded Father; you ran
to my tent that night, held me in your arms and let me cry
into your embrace as you revealed your plan.
Oh
Grandma, you consoled me in my barrenness, you hugged me when I'd sigh
upon hearing that my sister had birthed another boy.
But Grandma, who will console me now? How can I say goodbye?
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2nd.
Prize:
Lara
Kwalbrun-
Memoirs of a Leper
Alas the itch that spreads like spilled milk
A misshapen tattoo etched on my arm.
Perhaps it will disappear with dawn,
This stubborn stain that resists scrubbing.
The High Priest has made a house call.
Unfolding his linen cloth and instruments
With the meticulous manner of a surgeon.
Bending over me by the window
He smells of incense, fresh and pure,
Silent as snow.
There
is murmuring outside the door
An inspection of the white mold, God's graffiti,
Growing like ivy on the garden walls,
Painting the rooms where once we
Laughed pleasantly and told tales.
The
verdict has been handed and commanded.
I will live in a temporary tent,
Sewing in the dim light,
The seams of torn cloth.
A shipwrecked man,
Marooned by a marauding tongue.
I see them from a distance on the Sabbath day,
Arms linked. Inside the hollow tent I cry out to God
Who has marked me like Cain, penned curses on my flesh,
Used me for target practice, as I have done
With the arrows of my tongue, daggers
I am a broken shard, a lion in God's sheep pen.
Take these pigeons then, one for me and one for you
We are bound by the feathers I gather.
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3rd. Prize: JohnMichael
Simon After
the War
Now
that the guns are quiet
the hills awaken, don green clothing
Now
that the missiles cease their roar
the birds hop out of hiding places
make short trips over still smouldering trunks
Now
that the air begins to clear
patches of blue appear
damage assessors arrive, inspect, measure
jot inscriptions in notebooks, make calculations
Now
that the guns are quiet
children emerge from shelters
kick balls, ride bicycles, flip skate boards
The
grocery store restocks its rows
of yoghurts, cheeses, fruit and vegetables
Now
that the guns are quiet
deep in the ground, fingers make tallies
count bodies, dust off prayer books
draw up lists, encrypt messages, mark maps
An
army of ants crawls from hidden cracks
warriors carry shiny new weapons
wasps begin the task of hive reconstruction
black and red hieroglyphics
Now
that the guns are quiet
lilting cadences cry out from turrets
calling the faithful to prayer
Now
that the guns are quiet
somewhere in a cave
a skull winds a turban in coils
hiding thoughts, hiding plans
Until
all that remains visible
is a sharp beard and a pair of flat eyes
unfurling from the gloom
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4th. prize: David
Silverman- How
Cupid Saved My Marriage
When you were born I was two months
and twenty-three days old. And on that day,
in celestial chambers, the Committee on
Prospective Matches convened a meeting
to discuss the matter of us.
Cupid looked around the table at the
assembled angels, and felt a headache
coming on. He wanted to get home for
dinner, but knew this would not be easy.
Wearily he asked, Arguments?
The angels all spoke at once:
He'll be a slob! He won't listen!
He'll forget her birthday! He'll snore!
She deserves better, said a prissy
angel whom Cupid had never liked.
Just look at her (a slide of a beautiful
baby girl was projected across a
nearby cloud. The angels sighed
in admiration).
They babbled on and Cupid massaged his
throbbing temples, no longer listening.
If this kept up, he would never get home,
and she was serving pot roast tonight, his favorite.
These angels were always so sure of the math,
but the calculus of couples defies the rational
laws of nature. Though he had to admit the
match looked bad on the surface, there was
something about the combination of these two
that made him smile. In the end, it was his
decision, and he declared, Enough! They are
right for each other, I'm going home.
But, Cupid, the prissy one cried: what about the snoring?
They'll work it out, he said, thinking of his own deviated
septum. He could not wait to get home and tell his wife about his day.
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Honorable Mentions:
Hurry,
by toni
tyler
Is it just because the web is faster
Getting news, you think cogently.
God is coming much sooner than
Your God is due? Prophesy told and done,
Last chapter says who won.
Do the Shia - or do we forget Iranians, Syrians
Are remnants too, Yefet's Medes, Persians
Using Hezbollah whore of the day
To range the hope, children born to kill
themselves?
If I write in err then why, then how, then
where
Do we germinate ideas Israel is the cause?
Can anyone show me divergent view,
Empire new; Roman, Egyptian, Persian, Brit,
Communal Bloc, G-8. Zion's too
Not Avram's faith - Oh! include Crusades?
If
not, quote me. "The hurry?
Find the damn bridge!
Make peace of chaos, agree to end wars
of Noach's kids for control over each other.
Design a plan that feeds,
Clothes.
shelters all.
Then, I call you men!"
Did I slur, "Get Over it!"
Hanging
By the fleshy sole of palms
Pierced through the bone with nails,
Bleeding
On a freshly hewn limb of cursed tree.
One anointed speaks,
'Forgive them...
They don't have a clue
Of what they do to you
By what they do to me....'
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The Best Revenge,
by Elleraine Lockie
116,
"On
Thursday 7 July 2005 a series of four bomb attacks
struck
London's public transport system... 56 people killed, 700 injured. "--
Wikipedia
By my annual October
trip to London
I have buried the exploded British bodies
under Katrina's casualties
But still can't take the bus two kilometers
from Euston Station to St. Margaret's Hotel
Suitcases too heavy to lift Into a bus I tell myself
Losing my first private battle against terrorism
As I pull two suitcases and herd the
third
down Upper Woburn Place
All the while awarding myself a walking ovation
for having flown the day after 9/11
Self importance goes
worldwide at Tavistock Square
where a woman's professional camera
equipment blocks the sidewalk
And leaning against a park fence
is a garden-sized plastic bag spilling bouquets
and the budding bloom of a young girl's face
Her glossy paper smile
gazing at the overcast sky
And I know instant!y the
sun hasn't smiled
on her parents since the seventh of July
I don't need to hear from the photojournalist how Tornado Hussain lifted the
roof
off a double-decker bus
How it twisted through the air
And set passengers down on nearby walls
in three-dimensional red globs
A movement from the school of Islamic abstract art
Later I stand in ambiguity
Body fixed by fear in front
of Russell Square's tube window
Mind correlating the risk of a one-time ticket with an economical week's worth
Summoning courage to
connect
with Brits passing me by
Who wear IRA history as casually as the scarves relaxing around their necks
They buy their ways into the burial chamber below Where another shrine waits
To remind us that retaliation can be as peaceful as purchasing a public transit ticket
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A Hidden Face, by Lara
Kwalbrun
There is a rumor that
the Holy Ark
Was pilfered from Jerusalem,
Perhaps by a wayward son.
Jealous of an absent father,
Making mischief for attention.
That old story.
No longer beleaguered
By the task of leading armies,
The ark is a retired General
Who only recalls with a hollow cough
How once he glittered in the face of
The Philistine foe.
Its communing angels
Are silent on the subject of
Conducting divine correspondence.
The ark is now unplugged.
Disarmed of its electric shield
That shocked like a live wire.
Singing the soles of
Whomever steadied its sides.
Now it might sit
in the soft soil,
Hibernating in Ethiopian hills
And monitored by a monk
In lily-linen robes
Who lost most of his teeth
In his youth.
Like a tactful knight templar
He stares sternly at curious strangers
Often taking brief breaks from duty
or bread and mint-tinted tea.
And as the sun sets
And the angels slumber,
Dust collecting on their numinous wings
The old priest
Whistles a song he
Learned long ago when
The Levites sang with the lyre.
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HAGAR, by Fay
Lipshitz
So we do not die
Now, the well appearing just in time.
The boy will live, grow up
To be ( what did the stranger say')
A wild man.
To the wilderness then
The lad and his wild mother.
Paran? Yes. Far, in any case,
From the old woman's spite.
Already 1 feel the hot wind bite
And lash my flesh, eyes slant
Against the light.
It was not always so -
With joy I knew him,
Bore his son, was silent
When they ordered circumcision,
Saving, there was a covenant_
What terror at thirteen -‑
His father's upraised hand, the knife.
And hers - who will inherit all -
An infant when he had his done.
No knowledge of betrayal.
(Yet why do I we in my mind's eye,
Concerning the other lad,
A whetted knife, a fathers aghast eye,
A trembling at heaven's throne?)
No matter
Let us go south, to Paran
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Judean
Desert, by Fay Lipshitz
Only
monotheism could come from this
said the writer
when he saw our Dead Sea hills.
There's
no crevice for a nymph
anywhere.
No mist to drift
and blur
the arrogance of stone.
Just clarity, strident on bare rock
among the mad-eyed goats,
calling in harsh language
words that know
what they mean to say.
Yet I must believe there was a time
during the making of all this,
of hesitation, a drawing back
in doubt
But it was decided,
the moment gone
as wind and sand
sweep away traces
of the soft and startled deer.
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Breasts,
by Ricky
Friesem
One breast
Two breasts
No breast
Depressed
Full breast
Small breast
Proud breast
Impressed
Tired breast
Pert breast
Bouncing breast
Caressed
Mothcr's
breast
Lover's breast
Breast best
Undressed
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Hanging Rainbows by Ruth
Fogelman
When
the sky is grey and there's no sign
of the sun shining through
can I hang rainbows on the line?
When
the day grimaces and you
think there's no chance of light. no chance
of' the sum shining through.
can I still get up and dance.
tossing such thoughts across mountains to the seas
that there's no chance of light, no
chance
of
gold-winged butterflies riding the breeze?
Can I drape indigo, violet and pink
and toss such thoughts across mountains to the seas.
knowing that the sun can smile in an eye's blink
azures and reds of morning -
can I drape indigo, violet and pink
on miracles unfurling?
When the sky is grey and there's no sign
of azures and reds of morning
can I hang rainbows on the line?
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END of POEMS
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