Winner
Judge's Comments:
First Place: Linda Dove – “Scheherazade Finishes”
“Scheherazade Finishes” brilliantly maps the classic storyteller’s endless yarn onto our own daily lives. Just as the doomed bride-to-be staves off her fate each day by inventing another cliffhanger, we too save ourselves with the stories we tell. Every day’s to-do list is a talisman against death as we try to make it to tomorrow, where love might live. This is a poem to know by heart, and recite on one of those long nights.