Poetry Contest for Teens
This year’s theme: Fresh Air.
When the world gets overwhelming or life gets hard, what helps you take a deep breath? What do you see in the air around you, what are the things that ground you?
Congratulations to all the teens who released their creative powers into the world by submitting their poems to this year’s contest. Your sensitivity, perspectives and creativity are awe-inspiring and it was tough to pick the winners! Thank you to our judges for the children’s and teen poetry contests – children’s authors Jean Mills and Kira Vermond, Wellington County librarians Danielle Drimmie and Daubney Thielking; writer and educator Katarina Vuckovic, former teacher-librarian Allison Montgomery and Amy Lychwa from Guelph Public Library Youth Service!
Junior High (Grades 9-10)
First place
“Hiraeth”
By: Grace Cao
Each night the shouting filled the halls,
And scraped against my skin,
My father’s words like sharpened glass,
My mother’s silence thin.
They said they loved me through the fights,
Through all the tears I knew,
But never saw the quiet ways
Their anger broke me too.
I learned to make myself grow small,
To speak in careful tones,
To hide beneath the staircase dark
And swallow all my own.
There I would fold my paper cranes
From letters filled with lies,
And press my hurt in every crease
With wet but hopeful eyes.
They said a thousand cranes could grant
A wish your heart held true,
So every night I bent the wings
And prayed the screaming through.
But when the thousandth crane was made,
The house still shook with rage,
And I no longer dreamed of love
Or brighter, kinder days.
I only wished for one still night,
One hour untouched by fear,
No breaking glass, no slamming doors,
No sharp words ringing clear.
Then all at once the paper flock
Rose susurrant toward the rain,
Their folded wings became alive
Beyond the windowpane.
I reached to catch the thousandth crane
Before it flew away,
But in the storm its paper thinned
And melted in the gray.
The salt rain soaked through fragile wings
Until they came apart,
And scraps of white dissolved like snow
Against my threnodic heart.
Runners up
“Screaming at the Lake” A poem for my mom
By: Caroline Scholes
There is something r a w and v u l n e r a b l e about anger
Something t e r r i f y i n g and h e l p l e s s in spite
Lost in the sea with no anchor
Tears stain my face, blur my sight
Two years ago I’m sitting in the passenger seat of your car,
I’m fourteen, I’m not breathing, I’m not seeing
My bully’s words finally broke through and broke me at the core of my being
You grew up in a town thirty minutes away from that parking lot
“we have all day”, you say
I don’t give it another thought
You turn on the stereo while we coast to your hometown by the water
I was mad at the world but I was glad to be your daughter
We took off our shoes
It was still winter and the sand was cold
I tried to focus on that. Not what my worth was or so I’d been told
The beach is beautiful, I think: it sure is
When I felt like I was drowning, you took me to where the shore is.
Thinking now, anger and spite are feelings I can shake
But I will never forget the hoarse sound of release
Standing beside you, screaming at the lake
The waves ate up the noise, desperate and greedy
I am too. I need peace, I need you, I need me
As I am lost in the crashing water.
Lost as my voice wanders
Screaming, singing the sound of my panic and anxiety
I think I let myself let go of something inside of me
Whatever had been bothering me, I couldn’t find myself to care
As that feeling is set free, it disappears into the November air
I could never truly describe that moment, there aren’t words, there isn’t a good enough poet,
There is something I kept with me from that day, something that stuck in my head,
I am enough, enough said.
“Come Outside My Friend”
By: Fiona Luan
This time, I did not pause.
The world beyond glows with quiet wonder —
Why stay confined
within a cage with no name?
Come outside, my friend.
This time, I did not doubt.
Life out there leans toward you in kindness —
Why be caught for so long
in the turning tide of unease?
Come outside, my friend.
This time, I asked no questions.
The horizon shimmers, endlessly inviting —
Why paint your days
in shades imagined from the dark?
Come outside, my friend.
This time, I did not resist.
The light falls softly on the earth —
Why hurry back
to the cold hush of sleep?
Come outside, my friend.
No more hesitation,
No more doubt,
No more restless asking,
No more turning away.
This time, I unlatched the long-closed door.
A tender breeze found my face —
Why spend whole days in tears,
When even the wind can carry sorrow from your skin?
This time, I stepped beyond the threshold.
Birdsong gathered in the air —
Why let your voice grow faint and worn,
When such music can teach it how to sing again?
This time, I ran into the open fields —
into the boundless breath of the world.
The air — so clear, so alive —
It drew me in.
“One More Chapter”
By: Sharadha Giri
The air in here feels borrowed.
It smells of wet bark and the first flower of spring.
It’s metallic and earthy from an ancient sword.
It reminds me that I’m allowed to breathe.
I close my eyes and feel the ceiling fall away.
When I open them, I’m in the book.
I breathe in a world with rules
where magic costs something real,
where villains monologue like they’re paid by the word,
and where a lover waits in a moonlit courtyard.
My chest unhooks, and the knot gives way.
I ride the wind off a dragon’s wing,
over a kingdom
that wants nothing from me.
I turn the page and stay a while.
I leave my worries folded in the crease of the spine,
like a breath of fresh air.
“Becoming”
By Natalie Talusan
a whale bathes in the sun
mighty and all
beached on a summer’s day
one-hundred years of swimming,
surfacing,
-& then suddenly choking on spoiled feathers?
so i’ll wait for the right wave to wash in
& emerge with wings
“Cross-stitching”
By: Shelly He
Out there, minutes suck on joy, the air blooms with messages
urging answers, urging people to be somewhere else.
But here, one needle shimmers with silver-white light,
smaller than the minute hand, thinner than the second hand.
The clock melts, pressure deflates, and patience quietens the spinning.
Head down (I do not look up).
My hand never stops:
pink for a hat that someone will wear in the cold,
blue for the sky between clouds you could rest your head on and forget your name,
the cloth, the colour of unwritten hours.
Each cross I make is a soft shield pressed against the noise, a small refusal,
letting nothing through. The clock above me spins and spins. I am still; I pull the thread
through once, and then again. And then again.
The minute hand loses its grip, but my needle flies, carrying me back into myself,
stitch by stitch, like a letter folded back into its envelope.
Senior High (Grades 11-12)
First place
“I Believe in God for Five Seconds”
By: Rose Haberer
You cannot take time out from you like a bone. It does not gather and loosen. Does not pile into snow or die like snow.
It will not stretch or thin for you,
the way your body does. It turns even the planet into nothing but a wall clock.
I agree with glimpses —
with the seconds it takes for water to surrender to my hands,
slipping through the cracks of my fingers;
With the years it takes for my hair to fall to my back;
with the slow drag of my childhood,
and the quickening hours of twilight.
And with the knowledge that a mayfly lives for a single day —
one quiet tumble of the earth,
one rising and sinking into oily light.
I like to believe that when it opens its many wet eyes for the first time
and sees the morning sun,
it knows:
Nothing is more beautiful than this.
2.
As I go down to the tap,
And fold my hands,
I birth water —
in the cup of my fingers.
Strokes of light move in it like Koi in a pond.
Birth is but a greeting where
you give something a body.
The language of my mouth becomes a timer
ticking in the dark of my teeth
as I count the life I’ve made:
1
2
3
4
5
seconds
and time slips out from me.
Succumbs to the drain.
The wet skin of my hands
makes me believe there is something
out there
counting me.
Runners up
Free to Breathe
By: Zuhairah Jaudat
The once dreadful bell is now music to my ears.
The sound I’ve been holding my breath for—waiting for what feels like years.
Suddenly the weight I’ve been carrying for months slides off my shoulders.
The backpack hits the grass like a hefty boulder.
I’ve escaped the glow of screens,
the chaotic canteen,
and living off of caffeine.
All the dates, deadlines, and derivatives leave my mind,
suffocating me time after time,
and all I want to do is enjoy the daytime.
A quick text lights up my phone:
“Meet us at the park?”
Within minutes we’re all together,
staying out until it’s dark.
The air feels different somehow,
lighter than before.
Every laugh opens a window,
every joke unlocks a door.
No grades hanging over us,
no pressure to compete.
Just friends stretched out in the sunshine,
with the world beneath our feet.
The fresh air I needed was to be with the people I love,
not needing to rush.
Just living in the moment,
the feeling is oh, so potent.
“One of a Kind”
By: Lylah Yon
The devil who loves her,
Sex, drugs, smoking, art
One tenth skill and nine tenths luck,
Freelance artists, born of twisted steel,
Not unlike the instrument beneath identity.
Emboldened by likeness
and
gravestones
Her appeal infamously punishing,
her form young and especially creative with its power.
A breath of fresh air,
In a world full of pollution.
