Winners of 2022 High School Poetry Competition Announced The Society February 1, 2022 From the Society, High School Submissions, Poetry, Poetry Contests 1 Comment . First Place ($200 Prize) Alex Rubstein, 12th grade, homeschooled, Canton Aargau, Switzerland "Civis Romanus Sum" . Second Place Ellie Strano, 9th...
Winners of the 2022 SCP Poetry Translation Competition Announced The Society February 1, 2022 Poetry, Poetry Contests, Translation 4 Comments . Judges Margaret Coats Evan Mantyk . First Place ($100) Talbot Hook, Connecticut "Mourning the Dead" by Li Qingzhao; "Bamboo-Grove Pavilion" by...
‘Plum Blossom Blessings’ by Margaret Coats The Society January 31, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 33 Comments . Plum Blossom Blessings The pine, bamboo, and plum are winter’s friends, Yet plum trees bloom to overcome the chill And herald spring. Resilient...
‘Starbucks Villanelle’ by Matt Hsu The Society January 31, 2022 High School Submissions, Humor, Poetry, Villanelle 9 Comments . Starbucks Villanelle Will someone call an order for Elaine? I have a bunch of stuff I need to do. The wait today is driving me insane. This one...
The 10 Best Love Poems of 2021 The Society January 30, 2022 Beauty, Best Poems, Love Poems, Poetry 5 Comments . The 10 Best Love Poems of 2021 What makes a great love poem? Love is such an emotionally charged topic that the answers to that question are going...
‘The Blood of Revolution’ by Camille Cechini The Society January 30, 2022 Culture, Poetry 3 Comments . The Blood of Revolution The blood of revolution fills my veins; Of those who fought to sever tyrant’s chains, Of those whose voice of freedom...
‘Tel Shikmona’ by Judy Koren The Society January 29, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 10 Comments . Tel Shikmona Mosaics here surprise: you wouldn’t know, tramping on thistles, dry late-summer stubble and tripping over rubble, stumbling,...
‘My Mother’s Eyes’ by Carl Kinsky The Society January 29, 2022 Beauty, Poetry 7 Comments . My Mother’s Eyes We took a ride into the countryside to search for bluebells but we first saw phlox. Delighted by the sight my mother...
‘Sir Percival’ by Alan Grant The Society January 28, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 5 Comments . Sir Percival A quiet desperation lives within my soul: to find the Holy Cup, the Grail; to touch something beyond this mortal pen, and taste my...
‘Solitude’ by Müller and ‘Serenade’ by Rellstab, Translated by Joseph Greene The Society January 28, 2022 Beauty, Poetry, Translation 10 Comments . Solitude by Wilhelm Müller (1794-1827) | from German by Joseph Greene As when a cloud is darkened And drifts through sunlit sky, While through...
A Poem for Holocaust Remembrance Day: ‘Never Again’ by Susan Jarvis Bryant The Society January 27, 2022 Culture, Poetry, Rondeau 18 Comments . Never Again Never again, beneath the sun Would mortal beings come undone. A pledge arose and soared on high--- It warmed the heart and lit the...
‘Bach in Heidelberg’ by Lionel Willis The Society January 27, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Music, Poetry 7 Comments . Bach in Heidelberg for Marjorie Bach’s chorus didn’t leave us much to say After the Easter Monday concert in The Holy Spirit Church. Taking our...
‘You Are Too Far from Me’ by Arthur Wood The Society January 27, 2022 Beauty, Love Poems, Poetry 4 Comments . You Are Too Far from Me Send me your love for I’ve nothing to write,And my words are vacant or ugly---I slept through the morning, I raved out...
‘The Attempt to Curse J.K. Rowling’ by Brian Yapko The Society January 26, 2022 Culture, Poetry 46 Comments . The Attempt to Curse J.K. Rowling Once upon a time the stars aligned To strike a writer bound for King’s Cross Station As if by magic with this...
‘The Demons of the Night’ by Peter Hartley The Society January 26, 2022 Culture, Poetry 16 Comments . The Demons of the Night All since she left me I have lived in fear Of creatures dwelling in the shadows here, And all around and pressing into...
‘The Two Corteges’ by Soulary, Translated by Hadyn Adams The Society January 25, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry, Translation 4 Comments . The Two Corteges by Joséphin Soulary (1815-1891) | translated from French by Hadyn Adams Within a church two groups of people met: An infant’s...
‘On the Cost of Doing Evil’ by Lee Goldberg The Society January 25, 2022 Culture, Humor, Poetry 7 Comments . On the Cost of Doing Evil I care not if the sky burns red and human flesh is seared. I pray that all souls will just rot as many long have...
Two Poems for Burns Night 2022, by Susan Jarvis Bryant The Society January 25, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Humor, Poetry 29 Comments . Toasting Burns His words ring out from windswept glens. __They lilt from lapping lochs. I see love through his red-rose lens; __I hear the...
‘Dystopia’ and Other Poetry by C.B. Anderson The Society January 24, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 13 Comments . Dystopia Reality is never what it seems To be. It hides itself in shrouds of mist, In bulging envelopes of gilded dreams, In requisite pronations...
Poems by Li Qingzhao, Wang Wei, and Du Mu, Translated by Talbot Hook The Society January 24, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry, Translation 13 Comments . Mourning the Dead by Li Qingzhao, Southern Song (1084-1155) | from Chinese by Talbot Hook Above in the heavens the star-river flows; Down on the...
‘The High Cost of Low Prices’ by Mark F. Stone The Society January 23, 2022 Beauty, Humor, Poetry 18 Comments . The High Cost of Low Prices Poetry is what I treasure. Books of poems give me pleasure, but my grief’s been hard to measure, since I did some...
‘The Joys of Spring’ by Janice Canerdy The Society January 23, 2022 Beauty, Pantoum, Poetry 5 Comments . The Joys of Spring a pantoum It’s here—sweet long-awaited spring. New blooms smell lovely; skies are blue. The trilling birds are on the...
‘Disambiguation’ and Other Poetry by Anna J. Arredondo The Society January 22, 2022 Acrostic, Beauty, Poetry 4 Comments . Disambiguation As in the dawn the nature of the beams Of light invading chambers---how they glint, Conceal with shade, or paint with rosy...
‘To Tchaikovsky’ by A.N. Apukhtin, Translated by Olga Dumer The Society January 22, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Music, Poetry, Translation 13 Comments . To Tchaikovsky by A.N. Apukhtin (1840-1893) | Translated from Russian by Olga Dumer With my musician friend’s departure A minor key pervades my...
An Extract from Canto 4 of James Sale’s StairWell The Society January 21, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry 13 Comments . The English Cantos: StairWell Canto 4 Leaving a broken relationship of the past behind in Canto 3, the poet enters a new world of education and...
Rescuing Contemporary Poetry from Vers Libre: An Essay by Leland James The Society January 21, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Essays, Poetry 36 Comments . Rescuing Contemporary Poetry from Vers Libre The conservative & informal vs. the free Before addressing my thesis, let me explain my choice of...
‘The Heroes of Beijing’: A Sonnet for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, by Evan Mantyk The Society January 21, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Human Rights in China, Poetry 6 Comments . The Heroes of Beijing on the Jan. 21 movie premiere of Unsilenced, just days before the Beijing Winter Olympics As great as it may be to send those...
Three Poems on Religion (with a short note) by Joseph S. Salemi The Society January 20, 2022 Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 13 Comments . Apocalypse The fractured sky splits, flaming at the edge— The earth heaves upwards in explosive wrath. No eye can bear the clay-caked risen...
Two Poems by Friedrich Hebbel, Translated by Sean Thompson The Society January 20, 2022 Beauty, Poetry, Translation 5 Comments . To Sleep, to Sleep by Friedrich Hebbel | translated from German by Sean Thompson To sleep, to sleep and only sleep And never wake and have no...
‘Self-Exile’ by Geoffrey Smagacz The Society January 20, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 8 Comments . Self-Exile "Parue—nec inuideo—sine me, liber, ibis in urbem.” —Ovid While driving underneath I had to pray: the tunnel, God, had better not...
‘Black and Red’ by Daniel Moreschi The Society January 19, 2022 Beauty, Poetry 9 Comments . Black and Red Within a latent, pathless peak, A mountain’s womb begins to leak The flicker of a fervent hue, When primal mantles stir a...
‘O, Brother’ by Damian Robin The Society January 19, 2022 Culture, Poetry 10 Comments . O, Brother Surveillance permeates us now,__George Orwell saw it coming.Stamped social credits mark our brow,__the cityscape is humming, The virus...
A Poem on the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, by Bruce Dale Wise The Society January 18, 2022 Culture, Human Rights in China, Poetry 4 Comments . The Winter Games Go On Although detainees must sleep in cramped cells on cement floors, and though they must wear shackles with their numbered...
‘Lockdown’ by Caitlin Venniker The Society January 18, 2022 Beauty, Covid-19, Poetry 9 Comments . Lockdown The day sprawls wider than a yawn, a mouth that sucks a ticking clock, a door that lets the wind blow in, but no one comes to lift their...
‘Sonnetized’ by K. Irene Rieger The Society January 18, 2022 Beauty, Humor, Poetry 5 Comments . Sonnetized “Why poetry?” My chair leans in his chair And slides me a sabbatical-swelled smirk. The past nine months I’d shouldered all his...
‘Living The Dream’ by Susan Jarvis Bryant The Society January 17, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 13 Comments . Living The Dream “I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”...
‘Martin Luther King, Jr. Meets Today’s Left’ by Russel Winick The Society January 17, 2022 Culture, Poetry 9 Comments . Martin Luther King, Jr. Meets Today’s Left How would the Left see Dr. King Just what reaction would they bring If he today could be our...
‘I Grieve Bleak Streets’ and Other MLK Day Poetry by James A. Tweedie The Society January 17, 2022 Culture, Poetry 31 Comments . I Grieve Bleak Streets I grieve bleak streets where handguns reign in terror Daring inner-city residents To duck and cover. Life used to be...
‘Let It Bleed’ and Other Poetry by Johnny Payne The Society January 16, 2022 Beauty, Poetry 3 Comments . Let It Bleed My family believes a puzzle piece is missing, that it’s me and if they snap it in, the family will have peace. The picture will be...
Four Poems on Truth and Lies, by Susan Jarvis Bryant The Society January 16, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry, Rondeau, Triolet 32 Comments . A Truthful Triolet I want the truth. I want to trust The words that trip from lips that lied. I want all doubt to fade to dust. I want the truth. I...
