Mark McKain

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Poem by Finalist Mark McKain

Chameleon

 

puffs its red throat-fan—
a warning stolen from the burning cane-fields.

 

My love and I pose
beside a wall of wrought iron and hibiscus.

 

I hold a ball of string. A wild dog sniffs the gutter.
Kite made of palm ribs hangs on thorns of a lime tree.

 

A hurricane of scents—sweaty skin,
spitted pig, bleeding fish—bathes the island.

 

We suck on oranges. Juice runs down chin
and stings the corners of mouth, sea-rain

 

and seared flesh streaming through hair.
A maroon centipede undulates.

 

Sugarcane ash falls on skin.

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Mark McKain’s poetry has appeared in many literary journals including The New Republic, Agni, Subtropics, The Journal, Cimarron Review, and elsewhere. He is the author of the chapbook Ranging the Moon and teaches screenwriting at Full Sail University in Orlando, Florida.

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Patrick Moran is the Winner of the 2011 Editors' Prize in Poetry

Thank you so much to everyone who submitted. We were completely overwhelmed by fantastic manuscripts.

Congratulations to Patrick Moran for winning the prize for The Book of Lost Things!

Patrick Moran’s poems, essays, and translations have appeared in a variety of publications including Crazyhorse, The New Republic, The Iowa Review and The Writer’s Chronicle. He is the author of two other collections of poetry, Tell a Pitiful Story and Doppelgangster.  Currently, he’s an associate professor of creative writing at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. He lives in Fort Atkinson, WI, with his wife, the painter Bethann Moran, and their three children.

 

Finalists are listed below. Check back during the next few week for poems from Moran and our finalists.

–Borrowed Wave by Rachel Moritz
–Vitreous Hide by Michael Edgerton
–Doubter Come Home from a Drowning of Vision by Carrie Meadows
–The Silhouettes by Lily Ladewig
–After Hurricane by Mark McKain
–ROBINSON ALONE PROVIDES THE IMAGE by Kathleen Rooney
–Blight, Blight, Blight, Ray of Hope by Frank Montesonti
–Rancho Nostalgia by James Cihlar
–Mirror Inside A Coffin by Maureen Alsop
–Paradise for the Rest of Us by Gary Hawkins
–No Tee Vee by Andrew Terhune