Give Us Your Vote

Oh! Give us your vote,
give us your vote
if you know
what's good for you.
Tokyo Police Club, Your English is Good

Last year at school I entered a poetry contest. The winning poems all had to do with love and peace, as I recall, which I think is okay to write about - but they were also reminiscent of the fourth grade, so I thought they were a little undeserving of first, second, and third place.

Not that my poems were much better - looking back, I like what I wrote, but that is a lot different from being proud of it. Being proud of it means that I could spit it out, memorized from so much work on it, at any moment. That I could read it, myself, over and over and enjoy it every time instead of seeing every flaw.

I see lots of flaws in my work, lots of the time.

But I'm entering again this year, trying to reign in my generally aloof topics to something semi-universal (or at least capable of being universally appreciated). I'd really love if you guys would read some of my more recent things and tell me what you think? Either here or there or in an email. I know people have liked what I've read at open-mics, but the judges of this thing are school librarians, not Seattle teenagers.

There is a big difference. (sla.org.uk and needle+thread)

Plus the librarian told me that there is scholarship money involved, which had better stretch out of state, cos I'm in it to win!