Artwork By: Kai Tananbaum
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Artwork by: Kai Tananbaum R I C H M O N D W R I T E S ! Sponsored and produced by the Richmond Arts & Culture Commission April 2019 Cover design: Kai Tananbaum This book contains literary works by Richmond students who entered the Richmond Writes! Poetry Contest. The Richmond Arts & Culture Commission solicits poetry entries from local schools, and all entries appear herein. Copyright of all poetry is held by the individual students, and cannot be reproduced without the express written consent from the authors and their parents. For more information contact Michele Seville, Arts & Culture Manager, City of Richmond, at 510-620-6952. RICHMOND ARTS & CULTURE COMMISSION 440 Civic Center Plaza Richmond, California 94804 Tel: 510-620-6952 www.RichmondArtsandCulture.org Follow: www.twitter.com/ArtsRichmond Printed by City of Richmond R I C H M O N D W R I T E S ! 2 0 1 9 TABLE OF CONTENTS An Introduction ........................................................................................... i RICHMOND’S POET LAUREATE PROGRAM .............................................. ii Poems by Daniel Ari, Rob Lipton & Ciera-Jevae Gordon. .................. iii JUDGES' BIOS ............................................................................................. 1 JUDGING TEAMS ....................................................................................... 4 AWARDS DESCRIPTION ............................................................................. 5 AWARDS LIST BY JUDGING TEAM…..……………………………………….6 WINNING POEMS…………………………………………………………….10 ELEMENTARY SCHOOL AWARDS………………………………………….11 MIDDLE SCHOOL AWARDS .................................................................... 27 HIGH SCHOOL AWARDS ......................................................................... 28 POEMS BY ALL SCHOOLS ALPHABETICALLY ................................... 37 BAYVIEW ELEMENTARY…………………………………………….........38-41 ELLERHORST ELEMENTARY………………………………………………42-47 GREENWOOD ACADEMY……………………………………………...48-55 HANNA RANCH ELEMENTARY………………………………………….56-61 KENNEDY HIGH SCHOOL……………………………………………….62-89 KENSINGTON ELEMENTARY…………………………….……………..90-141 KOREMATSU MIDDLE SCHOOL………………………………………......138 MURPHY ELEMENTARY SCHOOL…………………………………,,,139-169 OLINDA ELEMENTARY SCHOOL…………………………………….170-178 PERES ELEMENTARY SCHOOL………………………………………..179-187 SALESIAN HIGH SCHOOL………………………………………………….188 SHELDON ELEMENTARY SCHOOL………………………………….189-196 TARA HILLS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL…………………………………197-206 VALLEY VIEW ELEMENTARY SCHOOL……………………………...207-216 PARTICIPATING SCHOOLS AND TEACHERS LIST ................................. 217 RICHMOND WRITES COMMITTEE/ THANK YOUS ................................ 218 ART COMMISSION MEMBERS ............................................................... 219 RICHMOND WRITES! 2019 An Introduction This is the 9th year of Richmond Writes! – a poetry contest for students sponsored by the Richmond Arts & Culture Commission (RACC). The contest ends in April to recognize National Poetry Month. This book contains the poems submitted by students from ages seven to nineteen. The student poets come from Richmond elementary, middle, and high schools, and from the LEAP program for adult learners. Each student has written a short poem or haiku. The theme for 2019 is “You are the author of your own life”. Each student expressed his or her own experiences. Sometimes we feel we have power over our own life, and sometimes we are affected by circumstances. Students wrote about their own lives and how they see themselves. Students from thirteen schools submitted nearly 460 poems this year. Poetry was judged by an eleven-member selection panel: Rob Lipton, Steve Early, Terri Hinte, David Brehmer, Anne F. Walker, David Duer, Consuelo Lara, Silvia Ledezma, Ciera-Jevae Gordon, and Karin Fisher-Golton. Susan Antolin served as a special judge from the Haiku Association of Northern CA. Their bios follow on pages 1-3. Judges reviewed the contest entries in teams of two, together picking favorites in their respective packets. This method allows for discussion and compromise, yet still accommodates individual taste. Poetry, for both the writer and the reader, is extremely subjective, and the judges make a point of honoring that in their final selections. Poetry is a vehicle for feelings about life experiences. Some of the poetry you read here will amaze and delight you. Some reflects a darker side of life in Richmond. But all of the students have written about the world they see, and how they interpret it. We hope they will continue to embrace poetry as a way to process life. They have talent and insight, and we are proud of them all. Michele Seville, Arts & Culture Manager i RICHMOND’S POETS LAUREATE Richmond’s Poet Laureate program began in April 2012 at the request of then Mayor Gayle McLaughlin. The program called for a Poet Laureate to serve for a two-year period after being selected by a special committee of the Richmond Arts & Culture Commission. The city’s inaugural Poet Laureate was Dwayne O. Parish. After serving from 2012 - 2014, Parish was followed by three Poets Laureate for the 2015-2016 term. This unusual action was the result of an overwhelming number of outstanding applicants, whom the judges agreed should represent Richmond’s diverse community. The second term Poets Laureate were Lincoln Bergman, Donte Clark, and Brenda Quintanilla. They represented a broad scope of ethnicities, age ranges, and genders. They worked together for two years to promote poetry among our youth, and to act as spokespersons for the growing number of poets and writers in Richmond. The third term Richmond Poets Laureate for 2017-2018 are Daniel Ari, Ciera-Jevae Gordon, and Rob Lipton…who were again chosen jointly as a result of their high level of excellence. They have initiated daily poetry writing challenges to Richmond poets, poetry reading events, and have extended their service into 2019. Examples of the work of current Poets Laureate follow here. ii In those deliberate hands the stars could feel a freedom to stop shining or the wind to cover you with kisses instead of snow the trees on an uneven slope hide the corner of the moon the frost crusts the branches and you lie still there take me into your silence and brush the silence away like a leaf on your skin I brush away your hair to give you my memory of touch I press you hard to remind even death that everything is a moment and the moment enough - Poet Laureate, Rob Lipton iii This art By the marching rain maybe poems have another purpose in the writing, a slowing to notice ways beyond the familiar trail beside the carved creek, a practice of taking up the same building pieces and make an instead (instead as a noun, a cabin downhill from an old lodge that creaks in the wind like a falling tree). You curl like a fox in a warm den waiting the impulses of night pausing at a sound... I confess I don't know what foxes do. Let's guess they follow their foxness even when the river overruns its boundaries. It's not a demonstration, but an impulse string: this poem—a mysterious teaching. (I can't vouch for its reading.) So notice where you go when the creek rises from bed. Stop imagining a reader. - Poet Laureate, Daniel Ari iv 5 Times I Catch Myself Alive 5. Have you ever felt home in the uproar of a child’s laughter Be they discovered humanity on their tongue- sweet & savory before they know anything of it Or perhaps they peep at their own existence in a puddle & giggle at their beauty Before they know to question it 4. When my day has tried to consume me, i hurry myself into work I know that there are youth eager to vanish my pain Teach me of the lessons I have forgotten like how sacred creation is The truth is when i watch these youth create life out of only paper, paint, and glue sticks I am reminded of their magic How they weave an uninterrupted joy out of a hope I almost lost touch with 3. In all the ways we have tried to remedy our city of the ugly things My youth teach me how to salvage my own peace of mind Show me how to lift my voice when it is time to roar & when to quiet my soul when it is time to listen How to recenter liberation as a means to thrive How to reawaken the activism in my veins 2. When I’ve forgotten how to use my own voice My youth demonstrate with their own They teach me how vital love is How much the world is in desperate need of it 1.Richmond Youth are well aware of the state of our city They have never been quiet about it They have only waited for the rest of the world to see them To hear them v And the truth is They will lead us into such a beautiful tomorrow One that is impossible to access without them Without their passion Without their undying love for this city Without their voice And what an honor for all of us To be a part of the building of a world That they truly deserve - Poet Laureate, Ciera-Jevae Gordon vi THE JUDGES Susan Antolin is the editor of the biannual print journal Acorn: a Journal of Contemporary Haiku. She is a past president of the Haiku Poets of Northern California (HPNC), former editor of the HPNC membership journal Mariposa, and former editor of Ripples, the Haiku Society of America newsletter. Her collection of haiku and tanka, Artichoke Season, was published in 2009. Her work also appeared in the anthologies 57 Damn Good Haiku (edited by Michael Dylan Welch and Alan Summers) and A New Resonance 7: Emerging Voices in English-Language Haiku (edited by Jim Kacian and Dee Evetts). She was the featured poet in May 2017 on Cornell University’s Mann Library Daily Haiku site, where her work can be found in the archives. David Brehmer - Born and raised in Wanamingo, MN, David found his way to Richmond in 2005 and joined the poetry community. In 2011, he co-self-published This Has Happened: Words and Images after the Crash with artist Jeannine Chappell about their separate but parallel responses to the drunk driving crash that claimed Chappell's son, Alex, and left David in the hospital for a month. David's poems have been featured on Pacifica Radio, in the 2017 Richmond Poetry Anthology, and at the Bay Area Generations reading series.