We are thrilled to announce the winner of the Mini 2-Day Poem Contest that we played on Saturday!
Paula Turcotte is our winner, for “Something Gold”, written using the words “vinegar,” “copacetic,” and “flimflam.” You can read Paula’s poem below.
Congrats to Paula and thank you to everyone who participated! We hope you had fun, and that you feel proud of the poems you wrote using some of our favourite words from previous 2-Day Contests.
And if you missed the game, don’t fret! The real fun begins April 21-23, with the 2-Day Poem Contest itself. There’s still time to register right here!
Something Gold
Her feet dangle off the quilted bedspread, so childlike
you ache. You shimmy the wool over her ankle
while she shreds a Kleenex and hums something
country-and-western. Skin papier-mâchés
her fibula, bones still conspiring to uprightness.
Successfully sock-clad, she looks you in the eyes
and sounds out your sister’s name, having misplaced
yours months ago. The vinegar-sting
of this lapse bites, no less now than the first time,
but her toothless smile sugars the pill. You soften.
The Saturday visits are soundtracked
by the flimflam of cable news, punctuated
with paroxysms from her fellow residents:
someone stole a coffee mug, someone made eyes
at someone’s husband. The nurses march out
a conciliatory tray of cookies, the crowd
copacetic after a taste of oatmeal raisin.
Hand in yours, she ambles toward the bay window
at the end of the hall. Outside, two nuthatches dance
around bare branches of buckbrush, both species
she’s gifted you the words for. Her eyes shimmer,
something gold. Look, she says, squeezing your fingers. Look.