The Readers Advisory Committee is pleased to announce that Kayla Wiltfong has won our Build a Better World poetry contest. We enjoy Politics for both Wiltfong’s skill and confidence. She employs double-meanings to great effect, referencing multiple news items seen and heard in both social and mainstream media. On the surface, it’s a very short and simple poem, that evolves with each reading and teases our understanding. It’s clever in its aphoristic, tweet-like form, and addresses the theme of Build a Better World in an interesting way. You build a better world by saving what you value.
Kayla Wiltfong is a student in the undergraduate English program at the University of Missouri - Kansas City, with an emphasis in creative writing. She had two poems published in the 2016 edition of Elementia and three poems published in the 2016 edition of Shawnee Mission East's Free Lancer literary magazine. She can be found on Twitter @KaylaWiltfong or on Instagram @kaylawiltfong.
Politics
Do not leave your ballpoint,
gel, or fountain pens in reach
of your small children
and their stubby, Cheeto-dust
hands so that they can scribble
across famous documents
they haven’t yet read.