The Unknown Writing Contest Winner

Annie Newcomer.
Annie Newcomer
Star Rating
★★★★★
Reviewer's Rating
Feb 22, 2022

Johnson County Library is pleased to announce that Annie Newcomer has won our poetry writing contest on the theme of The Unknown with her piece "The Broken Plate: a Still Life." 

When we pause and wonder, I feel that we make better decisions for our world. It is easy to believe that the beauty of nature is invincible. But I believe it is tender and needs our care and not to be taken for granted. My nephew in Brooklyn, NYC created a beautiful collection of plates for my husband and self. Each is different and each is a work of art. When he gifted them to me, he was so excited to share that the plates were so well made that they could never break. When I returned home and unwrapped I saw a chip in one. I paused and started on a journey of reflection which led me down an ecological path.

Thank you, Annie Klier Newcomer

 

The Broken Plate: A Still Life  

  For Chih 

If we wonder often, the gift of knowledge will come. If we never wonder,

knowledge will never find us.
  ~ Arapaho Proverb

After my nephew swirled the colors,

glazed my gifts in red-rock he smiled

when handing them to me,

“Impossible to break.”

He'd dropped them before

and declared,

"Unbreakable"

his universe of plates.

Fired at Cone 10, he'd waited

until the kilns' duty completed.

Love-warm, my heart

absorbed the heat.

So I brought them home,

unwrapped and began placing

them into the cupboard

only to discover,

one fallen star,

shards too delicate

for glue. Sadness triggered

a repressed fear:

an arch, collapsing

in a national park,

by the time my grandchildren

are born, might never see.

Reviewed by Helen H.
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