The Thirty-First annual Winter Poetry Festival, sponsored by the Houston Chapter of the Poetry Society of Texas, offered twenty-three categories of contests this year.  Two of Sol's editors received eleven awards in the competitions.

Poetry Editor (former Sol Magazine Poet Laureate) Betty Ann Whitney was awarded three First, and a Third Place, plus an Honorable Mention.  Editor-in Chief Craig Tigerman was awarded a First, Second and Third Place, and three Honorable Mentions.

Here are Sol's Editors' winning poems:

Moving Ahead
by Betty Ann Whitney

It's nearly midnight at our new address, a warm night to finalize a beautiful day.  Who would have thought I'd feel so, with all the comings and goings, old memories and good times, now loose distances past.  I feel a great harmony and balance within.  It's uncommon for me to feel this way. Since we fled the disaster flooding our home over eighteen months ago, life has been more as a mirror, reflecting the place I'd rather be.

But today everything looks better.  This was a day of contemplation.  I've come to see that life is simply the result of many layers passed through an individual... the end result, like variegated silk, allowing us to see more and experience more, complete insight.

Here, no shore life flutters the perimeter of a body of water at the rear of the property.  Our new view is a variety of relaxing greens, where one could get lost in the foliage interspersed with budding flowers.

It's been only the past few days I've begun to loosen myself from an ever present focusing on what was, and to move on to an expression coming from creativity-- for my own enjoyment.  I've come to believe the effect one creates for their own enjoyment is the kind of creativity that is most fulfilling.  Life doesn't have to be set by the exact pattern we first had in mind.

It's high time I moved ahead, not with a set pattern of design, but with a pinch of this and a dab of that.  I've decided to plant even more gardens-- replace the patches of dead space.  My gardens will be constantly changing, framing butterflies and birds with tapestries of color.  And the center of each bud will glow like shoreline sunsets, inside my heart.

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Lung Cancer
by Craig Tigerman

Which puff was The One
That made it Too Late
Crossed the genetic wires
Guaranteed the growth

Which cigarette was The One
Before which, if he had quit,
This would not have happened

If only he had known,
He could have decided differently,
Walking the fine line between
The Warning on each package
And "it won't happen to me."

No Simple Vision
by Betty Ann Whitney

Third week of summer, a thin line of sweat spirals my neck
as I tackle the earth at mid-afternoon, pulling up weeds.
"You need a good eye for that" he says.
Determining slowly enough these days, my father,
bent over his cane, shuffles a slow foot movement
across the dirt path leading from his yard to mine.

But there is no bite to his voice today, convincing me
that he knows the purpose for which he comes.

Years back, my father's "Listen to me!" commanded respect.
He always chose the best advice his responsibility insisted.
Today, the measure of pitch has mellowed. At 83, my father
says, simply that I need a good eye.

In my father's eye there are different ways of seeing.
I have tried to see from every viewpoint...
looked aside, up, down, without, within.

I have seen in his expression a sudden look of detachment,
and I want to shout, DAD! which may be worse than having
nothing to see--and yet, a certain instance
of keen vision may accompany me.

I have tried to see from different viewpoints...
looked aside, up, down, without, within
and yet, I am a long way from knowing how he sees.

My father's world of vision has identified a million pictures,
has resolved a million problems.  Last week, my father
was not prepared for a question pending simple explanation.

Probably in the spring we could come into the garden
--in the strangeness of being, with many expectations
of perfection and little real knowledge of that we see.
 
Today, when my father sees me in the overgrown weeds
he says, "You need a good eye for that"
and I see so much I know of him.
 

A Simple Joy
by Craig Tigerman

Enduring, this place of peace:
My home away from Home
Backdrop for my heart's meditations
I explore deep matters of my soul.

We know our forebears' faith
Their Word of truth and wisdom;
My mind's eye sees them in fields
In warm Promised Land sun

Three thousand years ago
A plain where a person could perceive
Presence of a power from beyond
And be uplifted: a simple strength.

Under Mamre's oaks, outside Abram's tent,
A person could feel a simple joy
And dance a simple dance
All that was needed to carry on.

A hundred generations later
Some simple things abide, remain
In our complex, crowded, mechanized,
Sanitized, intensely material world

A simple truth, a simple strength
A simple joy, a simple dance
They're all I need to carry on.

The Color of Light
by Betty Ann Whitney

I never wonder
Is it really necessary
To steal a day at our special place
Where the slow motion of salt air
Ruffles my sundress
And his soft wavy hair...

It's not just a slower pace
Separating us
From the hundred busy things to do--
It's the way he looks at me
Through sun colored glasses
And says, I love you
And really means it.

Seasons of My Heart
by Craig Tigerman

The bleakest winter, deathly cold
In frozen ice blue I'd grown old
In silent stillness, none to hold
My heart in hibernation

Then you came, like the sun that thaws
And makes new life to sprout because
Its warmth overcomes winter's pause,
My heart your adoration

Cool flowing streams, sweet singing birds,
Bright colored blooms, your loving words
Are all to me and more, as girds
My heart for celebration

For then we laughed and sang and danced
In lushest meadows, souls romanced
Enraptured, enchanted, entranced,
Your heart my inspiration

Fat grew the fruits our spirits bore
They fell, inviting winter's store
Then cold winds blew, preventing more
My heart such jubilation

Now oft I sigh in shelter sought
From worldly ice-storms lately wrought,
But memories of your love have brought
My heart its true salvation.

I Am Ready
by Craig Tigerman

I am ready for the quietness at length,
To be done with the providing of strength,
The putting up with children, dogs and chance,
The nurturing of all save tender plants.

O I am ready, take me now away
From worry-ridden mammon days
To what is hidden save for dreams
Of freedom, that desired expanse.

I am ready to forego the struggle
Where feelings and obligations tangle,
Aspirations and expectations wrestle
Ensnared, reducing will to rubble;

Ready for the loneliness wherein I'll cry,
To break soul silence, and at long last die.

I Never Forgot
by Craig Tigerman

Now at my death I thus bequeath
These trinkets: take them all;
Worldly booty it is my duty
To assign, though it be small.

Intangible yet to the full
Shall love be my legacy,
For I have known one who has shown
The tenderest love to me.

To her I say this solemn day:
You were my treasure complete,
My joy, my sight, my heart's delight;
And though it was bittersweet,

The sweet prevailed, the bitter paled,
Darling, it mattered not:
The joy we shared, and how you cared,
Dearest, I never forgot.

To you alone on my tombstone
These words shall be my lot:
That from your heart I'd not depart,
My love, "I never forgot."

Saturated
by Betty Ann Whitney

It was the fisherman
with words like pearls
who told me
to be warm
we need nothing more
than sunshine
on the shoulders.

Early this Morning
by Betty Ann Whitney

Early this morning
the song of Niagara falls
into the dense fog
like a poem, at sunrise--
asking nothing in return.

A Decade Later
by Craig Tigerman

Ten years ago today we went
To court, where a smiling judge shared:
"This is the happiest part of my job,
Uniting families," she declared.

You had turned eleven the week before,
And to be my daughter you agreed.
The judge smiled, said a few words more,
Signed papers, and done was the deed.

Later that day we were driving somewhere
And I told you how proud I was of you,
I said "Never dishonor your family name,
But no matter what, I'll always love you."

So much has happened these past ten years,
But with all that you have been through,
One thing has always remained the same,
And that is my love for you.

You're twenty-one now, and well on your way,
But wherever you go, all you do,
I will always be proud and glad I'm your dad.
You're a joy to me, Chel.  I love you.
 
 

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