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