Millbrook Poets Awarded

The Storm King Poetry Contest awarded three Millbrook poets for their outstanding writing. Published poets Joanna Solfrian and Zoë Ryder White selected work from VIth formers Hannah Coon and Will Zelevansky, and IIIrd former Marvelous Aderibigbe among hundreds of entrants. Twenty poets are invited to the Storm King School to hear their work read aloud and accept a prize.
 
 
Inside is safer anyways

An alien relaxes inside,
Living in her own world.

Maybe she should leave, 
Her little bubble of safety.

See how life outside is going right now,
Socialize with her friends too!

Oh, it’s still burning…
She forgot about that.
 
Never again,
Never again.
 
by Marvelous Aderibigbe
 
 
Transience
 
“He’s a good swimmer,” Rosemary said.
Mrs. McKisco’s answer came with surprising violence.
“Well, he’s a rotten musician.”
-Tender Is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
 
I was a little person when I started to drum. From pots and pans to plastic containers.
The first dawns occupied by my miniature-sized drum set gave way to a battery of tight fists, 
Gripping and grappling at laminated lunch tables-
To a steady rhythm, a cold and close face spills verse from cracked lips
The hazy free jazzing of a sweet blued child.
 
When you have nowhere to drum, you begin to use your body
An absurd fashioning.
The frisking fleet of a straightened finger
The aching aorta
Your heartbeat.
Owning the rhythm and music of your body.
 
An articulation in your ankle allows for the heel and toe to mimic a myriad of style and story
On the schoolroom carpet, the subway, and the footboard.
To exist simply is to work, jerk, kick, and crackle.
With each beat the water bows and a low sound escapes.
 
by Will Zelevansky
 
Amba

“Vladimir Markov…met a grisly end in the winter of 1997 after he shot and wounded a tiger…The injured tiger …staked out Markov’s cabin, systematically destroyed anything that had Markov’s scent on it, and then waited by the front door for Markov to come home…When Markov finally appeared, the tiger killed him, dragged him into the bush and ate him.” — NPR, 2010
“Udege people believe that if someone attacks a tiger without a reason, Amba (the dark side of the tiger) will hunt him down. Unknowingly, Markov unleashed the Amba.” — Alvaro Laiz, 2018
i lie in wait 
for man            & dog             & gun
i leave             a tooth             in an axe handle                                                                     the crushed remains               of a water cup        in the yard    
a splash          of blood                       on the door    
    this primal rage,         this remembering: 
the sound of the shot               the wound & then the            raging pain 
is fire enough to                      melt the snow where i sit, 
evokes a feeling          no animal should 
have a name for—     
red-hot & one-track:                a score to settle 
muscle versus metal               this predator’s body 
borne of tundra & wild            a weapon 
just beneath the skin             just behind blackened lips 
between one second        & the next
a sudden silence                     & its breaking 
stillness & motion                   all at once
unlike men                               i do not know 
what it is                                  to be cruel 
but i have learned       an aching hunger 
for retribution 
for he who chose                    to take first aim
      who tied our passing lives            together the moment 
the bullet left the barrel 
        who started a trial                                   between man and beast i 
cannot help but finish            
& when i am done 
only his bones             & repentance
will be left to bury. 
 
 
by Hannah Coon
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