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Voices of Peace Poetry Contest
The 2023 Voices of Peace poetry contest, sponsored by the Cape Cod Veterans for Peace Corporal Jeffrey M. Lucey Chapter 041, was open to all Cape & Islands poets. Contestants were asked to submit a poem: “a) on thoughts of peace and the abolition of war, hate, or violence; b) on what I can do to help make a peaceful world for all; c) on some of the ways war can be avoided; d) on inner peace: how we become peaceful within ourselves so we can face the “other person” with mercy and forgiveness; e) on examples of nonviolent attitudes and actions that lead to friendship, negotiation, social justice, and peace.”
All 7th graders participated as part of Ben Parson’s English class, and the following three students had their submissions selected (poems below): Emme Carroll, Declan Diriwachter, and Madeline Park-Boudreau. Congratulations!
Poets whose submissions were selected are invited to read them at a public gathering at South Congregational Church, Centerville, on Saturday, May 20, 2023, at 10 AM. In addition to placement prizes, all awarded poets receive a copy of this year’s publication and a personalized award certificate.
Flow
Emme Carroll
Emme Carroll
The sun shines
In dappled light
Glinting its reflection off the brook
I smell the wet earth
Hear the wind in the trees
Watch a pill bug wandering along the rotten log where I rest
I rise
Feel the damp duff below the soles of my feet
Splash in
I wade
Through the cool water
Watch the birds flit between branches
Hours, minutes
The brook turns
I follow
smell low tide
See the marsh unfold
Spiky green grass
A heron disappears into the sky
The mud fades replaced
By silt
By sand
The creek spills
Out
into the sea
Over smooth beach stones
The water cools
A cloud of minnows scatter
Return curious
I sit
Water covering my legs
My hands pushed into cool sand
The sun shines
Peace and war
Declan Diriwachter
In times of war, the world stands still,
As nations clash and hearts do chill.
Families torn apart, dreams shattered,
Where death and destruction is all that mattered
In times of war, the world stands still,
As nations clash and hearts do chill.
Families torn apart, dreams shattered,
As death and destruction are all that mattered
And wars of the past slowly cease
For in the end, it is not violence that wins,
But the spirit of love that never dims.
So let us strive for peace with all our might,
And keep the flame of hope burning bright
Something Known as Peace
Madeline Park-Boudreau
Peace
An unknown trail
An unknown road
An unknown adventure
A new charted course
Not a place of no suffering
Not a place of no sadness
No loss or no loneliness
But a place amidst those things
Where still there is happiness
Where still there is joy
And still there is hope for the future
A place of being there for one’s self
Being there for others
A place where hardship and prosperity are not adversaries
But instead live amongst each other
Perhaps peace and tranquility is not an unknown road
But a place not so far away from us,
unseen to the naked eye
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