On June 17, 2017 the winners of the 7th Annual Beyond Baroque Poetry Contest will be reading their work in Venice, California.
Now in its seventh year, the 2016 Beyond Baroque Poetry Contest was judged by the award-winning poet Diane Wakoski. Over 900 entries from across the nation were submitted to the contest. Each winner receives a cash prize: first place $1000; second place $500; and third place $250. In addition to the three top prizes, two runner-ups were chosen. Winners and runners-up were chosen through a blind reading process in which the judge had no knowledge of the poems' authors.
Judge Diane Wakoski had this to say about her selections (without knowing authors identities):
First Place Winner, IN GEORGIA, A LAKE (by Maria Gillan, Hawthorne, NJ): This is a beautiful poem about both the personal and the public. I selected it for its use of the drying-up lake as a trope that represents something missing in the speaker, which evolves through the poem until it's revealed that the speaker has a large lake inside herself. The lake is drying up into a big hole due to global warming, and that hole is transformed into the place were her love for her son - who disagrees with her on important things like global warming - is not enough to close the difference between them.
Second Place Winner, A GLIMPSE OF BEAU JACK (by Robert Mezey, Claremont, CA): This is a very successful memory poem. It's very effective in tying the past and present together in the speaker's life.
Third Place Winner, CUT FLOWERS (by Linda Neil, Los Angeles, CA): This poem makes a profound statement on the world of fashion and our high concepts of beauty, which are really death mimicking life. Subtle and understated, this poem is doing so much more than it seems on first reading.
Runners-up : COTTON CANDY MAN (by Janet Nippell) and IN OUR HOUSE NOBODY EVER SAID (by Maria Gillan, Hawthorne, NJ) .
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