Hi folks. Rick Black asked me to post this press release. Congratulations to Chad Lee Robinson!
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Rick Black; 703-241-4127; rick@turtlelightpress.com
20% off pre-orders: http://www.turtlelightpress.com/products/deep-end-sky/2014 Haiku Chapbook Competition WinnerARLINGTON, VA – After a close competition, the winner of the fourth Turtle Light Press biennial haiku chapbook competition is Chad Lee Robinson’s
The Deep End of the Sky, a collection of poems that reflects the vast landscape of America.
Penny Harter, a prize-winning New Jersey poet who judged the contest, said that the poems of
The Deep End of the Sky “take us deep into the heartland of the country and of ourselves.” We immediately enter that “deep end of the sky” on the prairie in the stunning first two poems:
at
the
deep
end
of
the
sky
prairie
meadowlark—
all you'll ever need to know
about sunrise
“How wonderful that we fuse the image of the deep end of the sky with the singular and pulsing song of the meadowlark, which is “all we ever need to know about sunrise,” she said.
Robinson, the manager of a family owned grocery in Pierre, South Dakota, has been writing haiku for more than 10 years. His family settled in the small town of about 15,000 people when his grandfather was working on the dams on the Missouri river.
Robinson first encountered haiku – a Japanese form of poetry often written in 17 syllables or less with a connection to nature – in a creative writing class at South Dakota State University. He has won two other haiku chapbook competitions as well as a number of individual haiku prizes.
“He has a unique way of capturing the heartland of the country in poems that reflect the American landscape,” said Harter. For example, she said, consider this stunning poem:
hunter's retreat
the Christmas tree made from
racks of antlers
“It’s going to be a great book,” said Rick Black, the publisher of Turtle Light Press, which specializes in handmade books and artistic photography in Arlington, Virginia. “We had a lot of good submissions.”
Second place went to Julie Warther’s
This Side of the Pane and third place to Aubrie Cox’s
Out of Translation. Four honorable mentions were also given out:
a tiny hell by S.M. Abeles,
A Life in Transition and Translation by Chen-ou Liu,
Earthlings by Allan Burns, and
Rip in the Screen by Joan Prefontaine.
A total of 31 entries were received from around the world, including the U.S., Canada, England, Japan, Greece and Hungary. Turtle Light Press is planning a spring release of
The Deep End of the Sky, with a 20% discount for pre-orders (see link at top).
Topic: Winner Announced: Turtle Light Press Haiku Chapbook Competition (Read 4188 times)