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Literary Contest Winners

It’s Not About the Hot Mustard!

Another day of the same ole shit.  I get off work, pick the kid up and commence my after-work ritual of cooking dinner, baths, laundry and semi-cleaning up.  Well, tonight I am not cooking. My husband suggests "his" favorite Chinese.  I agree.  Oh yeah, "Hey boo, don't forget the hot mustard this time."  Hot Mustard is my favorite Chinese condiment, and the one mostly likely to be forgotten by my husband when we do Chinese carry-out.

Ironically, the second he walks in the door, he always remembers that he forgot it.  I don't know how he forgets it.  We have been together nearly 8 years, and I put hot mustard on every Chinese meal I have ever eaten...in a restaurant. Hot Mustard has been a source of contention since the very first egg roll. We have even fought over it.  Nevertheless, I eat hot mustard-less meals every time he picks up dinner. Sometimes, I don't even remind him to bring it, in hopes that there is some validity in reverse psychology. The only result is that he doesn't make the I-forgot-the-hot-mustard statement when he brings in dinner. Reverse psychology sucks! 

Khadijah K.

Grand Prize

EVOLUTION

            It is a notion of evolution as I sit with pen in hand recalling my beginnings in school in learning the alphabet and how each letter sounded separately and then together and then taking a book in my hand and learning to read as I said out loud the words together to make sentences and discovered complete thoughts where now I’ve taken the beginnings and molded my own structures to form stories that are excavated from layers below the cracked surface drawing upon that lonely day in class sitting on a tiny chair looking upward, eyes meeting their lids, following the wooden stick from letter to letter sound to sound from one blackboard to another.

            My eyes were clear and transparent and at times changing from dark moss green to a bright yellow-green much like the color of a young leaf when the sun hits it right, penetrating the flesh.  No lines around my eyes, just the youthful flow of bright inquisitiveness.  Apple cheeks then, drawn looser now with varying degrees of skin color.  A smile energetic and wide, reaching to the eyes, transforms the whole face as it talks.  The smile is now limited to its maturing for the eyes speak differently and separately from the smile.  A split face torn apart and aged with years, fine lines of milestones following along in an evolution of one’s mirror to the soul.

Nancy Chadwick-Burke

Finalist

                            To Live

To live is to experience the fullness of each moment.  Never to feel

I've wasted time, or squandered heartbeats.  Shaking up the

flows just enough to not get stagnant, but not enough to weaken

foundations.  The nectar of life requires that one stretch one's

being into the moments as they blossom in order to taste its

flavor.  The nourishments offered along the journey might be

missed by aimless buzzing around.  Perspective and attitude

flavor one's appreciation of the moment, and directly influence

one's connection to various experiences.  I want to live with an

attitude which longs for the living.  I want a perspective which

appreciates beauties and pleasantries but does not fault

shortcomings.  To live is to have senses maximally aware and an

exuberance in my traversals of beingness, infusing each

experience with the vitalities given through the inspirations of the

cosmic winds, ...  Listening to the whispers undulating upon the

fabric of existence, and filtering through the vibes to capture

glimpses of the mysteries of life, while caressing the substance

within which the journey progresses.  To live is to love living, to

bond with life in a communion of multi-phasic being, finding that

space of most shared overlap of my wholeness.  Skewed aspects

of my being, not disjoint, yet not fully expressible within other

aspects, all magically balanced in those precious, enchanted

moments when   I LOVE BEING  !.  To live is to generate

romance, by appreciating the buds itching to burst forth their

aromas, but too often neglected and left to wilt.  To appreciate

the romance of stardust gathered together to form the warm

flesh of my physical being, nourished by the stellar dew from the

mist of supernovae.  To savor the romance created through the

commonality of being with another, in the shared tapestry of our

worlds.  To treasure the romance of my spirit as it dances

amongst the inspirations and vitalizations which are the gifts to

be cherished.  To fathom the romance of always being with a

timeless soul which flavors my being, and longs to express.  To

gain wisdom from the romance of correlating and remembering,

giving continuity to the magic.  That's what living is...  To Live is

MAGIC.