The Fish Anthology 2019 will be launched as part of the West Cork Literary Festival (July 2019).
All of the writers published in the Anthology are invited to read at the launch.
Top 10 stories will be published in the FISH ANTHOLOGY 2019.
1st prize: €1,000
2nd: a week in residence at Anam Cara Writer’s and Artist’s Retreat.
3rd:€200
Billy Collins
Comments on the top 3 winning poems are from Billy Collins (below), who we sincerely thank for lending his time and experience to judge the prize.
Congratulations to the nine winning poets (one of the poets, Alex Grant, has two poems selected) and also to the poets whose poems made the short-list of 56, and to the poets who made the long-list of 183. Total entry was 1,641.
The overall winning poem Not My Michael Furey, by A.M. Cousins (link).
More about the nine winning poets (link).
Selected by poet, Billy Collins, to be published in the Fish Anthology 2019
FIRST |
|
|
Anne Cousins |
Not My Michael Furey |
|
SECOND |
|
|
Stephen de Búrca |
The Morning I Read Yesterday’s |
|
THIRD |
|
|
Colette Tennant |
Rehearsals |
|
|
|
|
HONORARY MENTIONS |
|
|
Judith Janoo |
Sugar Kelp |
|
Kerry Rawlinson |
Kindling |
|
Soma Mei |
No Results for that Place |
|
Alex Grant |
Raiding my Dead Mother-in-Law’s Pharmaceuticals |
|
Alex Grant |
That One Time I Decided To Be All About Eschewing Obfuscation |
|
Leah C Stetson |
Capes and Daggers |
|
John Michael |
Tequila Sunrise? |
|
BILLY COLLIN’S COMMENTS ON THE TOP THREE:
Not My Michael Furey by Anne Cousins
‘After immediately contextualizing itself with its reference to Joyce’s “The Dead,” this poem uses a deceptively simple diction to invite the reader into the mind and heart of its charmingly girlish narrator. Not a word is wasted in the clean, spare lines of this beguiling, bittersweet poem.’ – Billy Collins
The Morning I Read Yesterday’s ‘Daily Mirror’ by Stephen de Búrca
‘A clever take-off on Frank O’Hara’s startlingly everyday elegy for Billie Holiday, this poem even looks like the original. It’s most like O’Hara’s in that the elegy becomes the moment of the news (both in newspapers) of death, rather than a later meditation on the significance of the loss. The poem’s finest accomplishment is the delicate balance it maintains between the levity of satire and the gravity of the loss of an irreplaceable person.’ – Billy Collins
Rehearsals by Colette Tennant
‘Two stanzas are just the right form for this poem which moves from regrets about one’s mother to the more venial sins of childhood before circling back to the hypnotized mother’s vision of her own dying. Remorse may run wild, but the fresh images (“snot-angry bull,” “gaudy apple”) stabilize this unsettling and nicely unresolved poem.’ – Billy Collins
WINNING POEM:
by Anne Cousins
After James Joyce.
While the girls watched the boys kick a ball
on a scuffed patch of earth behind the school,
I hid in the pre-fab hut that served
as library and refuge to the bashful.
There was shelter among chipboard shelves
where books offered solace to a child
weary of feigning interest in the chatter
of fashion and elusive boyfriends.
Here were English girls learning life-lessons
in progressive boarding-schools; young women
in the Chalet novels bravely dodged Nazis;
and Miss Heyer’s Regency heroines –
all sprig muslin and beribboned bonnets –
were tastefully romanced by young bucks,
with chequered pasts and endless supplies
of starched cravats, who drove fast phaetons
and could tame a giddy young filly
with one smouldering, masterful glance.
Sometimes I saw a boy near the Crime shelf –
barely thirteen, fingers and teeth nicotined
as a man’s. Once we talked and he held out
his yellow hands to show their tremor –
he suffered with the nerves – he liked a thriller,
a mystery to solve, Poirot was the best.
I preferred Miss Marple’s investigations
among the murdering genteel classes.
If I ever thought of him after that
I would have imagined him on his tractor,
the cab filled with smoke as he turned the sod
in neat lines on his father’s beet-field.
Some years later, my mother wrote me –
the priest had called his name at mass,
requested prayers for his soul’s repose;
she heard the talk at the chapel-gate –
he was found in the barn, no mystery
how his life of hardship came to an end.
He was not my Michael Furey, never
my tender young love but I think of him
often – in a makeshift library long ago,
wits pitted against a fictional detective
and a small, shy girl for company.
MORE ABOUT THE WINNERS:
ANNE COUSINS was born in 1958 and has lived most of her life in Wexford Town. The arrival of her first grandchild in 2013 brought the realization that she was not getting any younger and she decided to run away and join the MA (Creative Writing) class in UCD. Her plan to write a perfect short story was scuppered by her conversion to poetry. She is working on her first collection and her work can be found in various literary magazines including Poetry Ireland Review, The Stinging Fly, and on the website Poethead. |
STEPHEN DE BÚRCA is working towards an MFA in poetry at the University of Florida under the guidance of Ange Mlinko. From Galway City, Stephen has worked at art-residencies in Iceland and the Netherlands. His poetry has previously appeared in publications such as Crannóg and Skylight47. |
COLETTE TENNANT, along with being an English Professor, plays keyboard in a garage band with a twenty-two-year-old drummer and a millionaire on the sax. At her university, she leads a group of student poets called Stinky Bagels. She lives in Oregon, one hour from the Cascade Mountains to the east, one hour from the Pacific Ocean to the west. Her most recent book, Religion in The Handmaid’s Tale: a Brief Guide will be published in September, 2019. On a recent DNA test, she found out she’s 80% Irish. |
JUDITH JANOO lives in Vermont, US, near the Canadian border where the smoke plume from her chimney goes straight up on cold days. She grew up by the sea rowing a dinghy before she rode a bike. Teaching yoga nidra, she sometimes puts others to sleep, which is not her intention in poetry. She sings to warblers and chickadees in the voice she hears, and thinks that they are singing back. |
Decades ago, autodidact & bloody-minded optimist KERRY RAWLINSON gravitated from sunny Zambian skies to solid Canadian soil, nurturing family and a career in Architectural Design. Fast-forward: she follows Literature & Art’s Muses around the glorious Okanagan, still barefoot, her patient husband ensuring she’s fed. Her photo-artwork, poetry & flash fiction have won contests, and feature in international literary publications. Kerry has become addicted to Canadian snowscapes; but she still pines for Zambian avacados. http://kerryrawlinson.tumblr.com/; @kerryrawli |
SOMA MEI SHENG FRAZIER, like the speaker in No Results for that Place, is between homes—relocating from California, where she’s served as a San Francisco Library Laureate, to New York, for a professorship at SUNY Oswego. Frazier’s sweet tooth demands sugar in everything but poetry and prose. Her work has earned nods from authors and entities ranging from Nikki Giovanni to Daniel Handler; HBO and Zoetrope: All-Story to Glimmer Train and the Mississippi Review. |
ALEX GRANT has been a shepherd, a dental technician, a rope-maker, an electro-plater, an optical technician, a software applications developer and a Business Solutions Architect. He has released five poetry collections and has received The Pavel Srut Poetry Fellowship, The Kakalak Poetry Prize, The Randall Jarrell Chapbook Prize and The Oscar Arnold Young Award. He was included in Best New Poets 2007. A native Scot, he lives in North Carolina with his wife, his dangling participles and his Celtic fondness for excess. |
LEAH C STETSON writes poetry at Nixie’s Vale beside a black-ash seep and a vortex. Eco-heroine and spiritual mermaid, Leah’s love of writing spawned at the mouth of the Sheepscot River in Maine. She holds a master’s degree in human ecology. Her writing has appeared in Arsenic Lobster, Off the Coast, Sea Stories: the Littoral Issue. Leah is a Research Fellow in the Interdisciplinary PhD program at University of Maine in a tenacious pursuit of deep, Romantic ecology. |
JOHN MICHAEL RUSKOVICH “Mike” Ruskovich taught high school English in northern Idaho for 36 years, and now he lives with his wife on the Camas Prairie near Grangeville, ID. His poetry has appeared in The Classical Poets Society journal, and his song lyrics appear throughout the novel Idaho, written by his daughter and published by Random House in 2017. Her essay about his poetry, titled “The Weight of My Father’s Poems,” can be found on LitHub. |
(alphabetical order)
There are 56 poems in the short-list. The total entry was 1,641.
TITLE |
FIRST NAME |
LAST NAME |
Kintsukuroi |
Gail |
Anderson |
Observation |
Valerie |
Bence |
Nancy saw you dancing |
Jackie |
Bennett |
No natural law |
Jackie |
Bennett |
Out There In The Rain |
Carole |
Berkson |
Ode to Sex with You |
Michelle |
Bitting |
Pinball |
Dean |
Browne |
Requiem |
patricia |
cantwell |
Not my Michael Furey |
A.M. |
Cousins |
A Poet’s Guide to Photography: The Bokeh |
Johnna |
Crawford |
The Morning I Read Yesterday’s ‘Daily Mirror’ |
Stephen |
de Búrca |
Seasalted |
Elaine |
Desmond |
MAN POEM WITH A KNIFE |
Judy |
Durrant |
Blackout |
Diane |
Fahey |
Climate Change |
Mary |
Fitzpatrick |
No Results for That Place |
Soma Mei Sheng |
Frazier |
octopus in the room |
Dean |
Gessie |
Raiding My Dead Mother-in-Law’s Pharmaceuticals |
Alex |
Grant |
That One Time I Decided To Be |
Alex |
Grant |
Minutiae |
Rosalind |
Hudis |
Room 764 |
Peter |
Hudson |
Ringing the Changes |
Steven |
Jackson |
Sugar Kelp |
Judith |
Janoo |
Man of Ice |
PETER UALRIG |
KENNEDY |
CLOSER |
Stacey |
Lawrence |
Doctor |
Zachary |
Loewenstein |
Her Father |
Niamh |
MacCabe |
Stark’s Ink |
Niamh |
MacCabe |
How We Remember Our Bones |
John |
MacDonald |
Upon The Hill |
Lindsey |
McLeod |
Late Hydrangea |
Lorraine |
McLeod |
writing bloomsbury 1924 |
Norm |
Neill |
At Loughborough Junction… |
Christopher |
North |
She’s Wonderful |
Michael |
O’Connor |
Readers’ Night at the |
Judy |
O’Kane |
Closing Time |
Matthew |
Oliver |
Annie |
Patricia |
Osborne |
kindling |
Kerry |
Rawlinson |
Metamorphosis |
Lee |
Romer Kaplan |
Listening for your return |
Elizabeth |
Rose |
Tequila Sunrise? |
John Michael |
Ruskovich |
The Dark Gatherer |
Kim |
Schroeder |
Capes and Daggers |
Leah |
Stetson |
Robert Hugh |
Anne |
Taylor |
Rehearsals |
Colette |
Tennant |
The Bends |
Roger |
Vickery |
Tandem |
Dana |
Walrath |
Rumination |
Angela |
Washington |
Halter |
Grace |
Wilentz |
The Ring |
Sarah |
Wimbush |
Luger, 1948 |
Guinotte |
Wise |
Asleep Before The Fire Dies |
Aram |
Wool |
Roundabouts |
Dorothy |
Yamamoto |
The House of Fiction |
James |
Bowden |
Walking on Edinburgh Hill |
Lynda |
McDonald |
(alphabetical order)
There are 183 poems in the long-list. The total entry was 1,641.
TITLE |
FIRST NAME |
LAST NAME |
Well Lived |
Lynda |
Allen |
Death of an Anchorman |
Savkar |
Altinel |
Kintsukuroi |
Gail |
Anderson |
When I was young and |
Karen |
Ashe |
God must be a polyglot |
Karen |
Ashe |
Decompression |
Debbie |
Bayne |
Green Hall |
John |
Beaton |
bedtime reading |
Taylor |
Bell |
Observation |
Valerie |
Bence |
Nancy saw you dancing |
Jackie |
Bennett |
No natural law |
Jackie |
Bennett |
Out There In The Rain |
Carole |
Berkson |
Ode to Sex with You |
Michelle |
Bitting |
Portmanteau |
Sharon |
Black |
Hearing Joni |
Denise |
Blake |
Upon Hearing Amy Winehouse |
Partridge |
Boswell |
Prayer |
Partridge |
Boswell |
Pinball |
Partridge |
Boswell |
Singing School |
Partridge |
Boswell |
The Optimist Files |
Partridge |
Boswell |
The House of Fiction |
James |
Bowden |
Auld Lang Syne |
Susan |
Browne |
Pinball |
Dean |
Browne |
In Tarry Flynn’s Shoes |
Mary |
Campbell |
Requiem |
Patricia |
Cantwell |
A kiss and a girl |
Veronica |
Casey |
Magnolia Wall |
Veronica |
Casey |
Road Kill |
Helen |
Chinitz |
Autism |
Leo |
Cole Snider |
The Lighthouse |
Colette |
Colfer |
Special Red |
Briony |
Collins |
Moth |
Briony |
Collins |
The Poem That Was Never Meant To Be |
Daniel Roy |
Connelly |
Too Big For This World |
Alexandra |
Corrin-Tachibana |
A Sighting |
Christine |
Cote |
WAKE, Midwinter 1980 |
A.M. |
Cousins |
Not my Michael Furey |
A.M. |
Cousins |
Angels and Witches |
Ann |
Craig |
A Poet’s Guide to Photography: The Bokeh |
Johnna |
Crawford |
Beautiful Lofty Things |
C |
DALLAT |
If Dogs Had Hands |
Claudia |
Daventry |
Crépuscule |
Claudia |
Daventry |
The Morning I Read Yesterday’s ‘Daily Mirror’ |
Stephen |
de Búrca |
Seasalted |
Elaine |
Desmond |
Breastfeed |
Koraly |
Dimitriadis |
Requiem |
Marylou |
DiPietro |
Gravediggers’ Strike, New York, 1970 |
Susan |
DuMond |
MAN POEM WITH A KNIFE |
Judy |
Durrant |
After Learning that Derek Killed Himself, |
Teresa |
Dzieglewicz |
in the shadows of the past |
Jo |
Ellis |
Blackout |
Diane |
Fahey |
Choices |
Laila |
Farnes |
The Superintendent’s Report |
Frank |
Farrelly |
Goreme (and elsewhere) |
Michael |
Farren |
How to |
Stephanie |
Feeney |
Epiphany |
Peter J |
Filkins |
TURN AROUND |
Steven |
Finley |
between the silences |
James |
Finnegan |
Climate Change |
Mary |
Fitzpatrick |
Will You Please |
Lili |
Flanders |
a small poem |
Danielle |
Fontaine |
No Results for That Place |
Soma Mei Sheng |
Frazier |
Leviathan |
Maureen |
Gallagher |
octopus in the room |
Dean |
Gessie |
The Metaphysics of Flight |
Carmine |
Giordano |
Hazel the Color (An Irish Song) |
Ellen |
Girardeau |
Cosmic Joke |
Alex |
Grant |
Raiding My Dead Mother-in-Law’s |
Alex |
Grant |
That One Time I Decided To Be |
Alex |
Grant |
Late-Night Gardening |
Jonathan |
Greenhause |
How We’re Methodically Picked Off |
Jonathan |
Greenhause |
Proposal in Alappuzha |
Shay |
Griffin |
Identity |
Arlene |
Grubbs |
And your text said |
Stuart |
Handysides |
Three Questions for the Buddha |
David |
Hargreaves |
Gull-Woman |
David |
Hargreaves |
That Feeling When…California is on Fire |
Matt |
Hohner |
Minutiae |
Rosalind |
Hudis |
Room 764 |
Peter |
Hudson |
Your Feet (A Lament) |
Isabel |
Huggan |
The Names of Seaweed and |
Mandy |
Huggins |
Dressing Room |
Penelope |
Hughes |
Eurydice |
Garrett |
Igoe |
Ringing the Changes |
Steven |
Jackson |
Sugar Kelp |
Judith |
Janoo |
The Missing |
Des |
Kavanagh |
The Venus Effect |
John D. |
Kelly |
Dance of the Machete |
Sarah |
Kelly |
Man of Ice |
PETER UALRIG |
KENNEDY |
In Traction |
Jay |
Kidd |
Vermont Moment |
Mel |
Konner |
The Politics of Seeing |
Judith |
Krause |
The London Ladies Pond in February |
Judith |
Krause |
Last Days |
Francesca |
La Nave |
Hiding from Daddy |
Ashley |
Lancaster |
SPARED |
Stacey |
Lawrence |
CLOSER |
Stacey |
Lawrence |
Forgotten Things |
Sarah |
Levine |
The Butcher’s Thumbs |
Deborah |
Livingstone |
Doctor |
Zachary |
Loewenstein |
Opossum Nights |
sandra |
longley |
Her Father |
Niamh |
MacCabe |
Stark’s Ink |
Niamh |
MacCabe |
How We Remember Our Bones |
John |
MacDonald |
Astronautical |
Anna |
Mae |
Diving |
Jessica |
Malcom |
Mornings At Carrowniskey |
Kilcoyne |
Marian |
FINDING JOYCE |
JOHN |
MCCABE |
Half-Mass |
Kevin |
McCarthy |
Five Seven Five |
Lynda |
McDonald |
Tokens |
Lynda |
McDonald |
Cartier-Bresson takes Sunday Communion |
Lynda |
McDonald |
Walking on Edinburgh Hill |
Lynda |
McDonald |
Prairie 1861 |
Christine |
McDonough |
Wonder |
Lorraine |
McLeod |
Upon The Hill |
Lindsey |
McLeod |
Late Hydrangea |
Lorraine |
McLeod |
Indigo |
Bruce |
Meyer |
Ants |
Bruce |
Meyer |
The Best Time to Grow a Beard |
Bruce |
Meyer |
The Bell Ringer of Iturbide |
Bruce |
Meyer |
Encounter |
sally |
michaelson |
Ledes |
Philip |
Miller |
i was home when it arrived |
Paul |
Mullen |
Almost |
Carla |
Myers |
writing bloomsbury 1924 |
Norm |
Neill |
Small Craft Advisories |
Bo |
Niles |
At Loughborough Junction… |
Christopher |
North |
Winter: Two Mornings |
Bridget |
O’Bernstein |
She’s Wonderful |
Michael |
O’Connor |
Compass / Witch |
Laurence |
O’Dwyer |
Right of Way |
Judy |
O’Kane |
Garryvoe |
Judy |
O’Kane |
Readers’ Night at the |
Judy |
O’Kane |
Closing Time |
Matthew |
Oliver |
Postcard from Galway |
Colette |
Olney |
Evening at Kuerners |
Patricia |
Osborne |
Annie |
Patricia |
Osborne |
Dior |
Romola |
Parish |
Alone in the Kitchen |
Anthony |
Powers |
The One Word I Can’t Seem to Say |
Grace |
Qualls |
Formica |
Maggie |
Rainey-Smith |
Quarryman |
Olivia |
Rana |
kindling |
Kerry |
Rawlinson |
Opposites |
Howard |
Robertson |
Metamorphosis |
Lee |
Romer Kaplan |
Listening for your return |
Elizabeth |
Rose |
At the US Immigration Desk, New York City |
Julie-ann |
Rowell |
Tequila Sunrise? |
John Michael |
Ruskovich |
The Dark Gatherer |
Kim |
Schroeder |
Au Moulin de la Galette |
Derek |
Sellen |
On the Birth of Hades |
Dean |
Shaban |
Middle School |
Derek |
Sheffield |
Her Present |
Derek |
Sheffield |
Geometry Angels |
Stuart |
Smith |
Dear Love |
Lisa |
St John |
The Breach |
Larry |
Stapleton |
Clothesemane |
vincent |
steed |
Capes and Daggers |
Leah |
Stetson |
Wind in a Box |
Andrea |
Stock |
robert hugh |
Anne |
Taylor |
MOURNING SONG |
Avery |
Taylor Moore |
Thankful I Find Her Anyway |
Colette |
Tennant |
Rehearsals |
Colette |
Tennant |
The Poet |
Ann |
Thompson |
Through flame |
Samuel |
Ugbechie |
Once again |
Samuel |
Ugbechie |
The Bends |
Roger |
Vickery |
Seascape |
rob |
wallis |
Tandem |
Dana |
Walrath |
To See |
Andrea |
Ward |
Rumination |
Angela |
Washington |
The Plain in Flames |
Christopher |
Watson |
Ghost of a Flea |
Dominic |
Weston |
The Irish Hunger Memorial, Battery Park |
Grace |
Wilentz |
Coral Castle |
Grace |
Wilentz |
Halter |
Grace |
Wilentz |
The Ring |
Sarah |
Wimbush |
Marram |
Elisabeth |
Winkler |
As If There Were More Than One |
William |
Winston |
Do Not Touch |
Sandra Ann |
Winters |
Anthurium |
Sandra Ann |
Winters |
Luger, 1948 |
Guinotte |
Wise |
Asleep Before The Fire Dies |
Aram |
Wool |
Alhambra |
Raphael |
Woolf |
Imagining the Lares |
Steve |
Xerri |
Roundabouts |
Dorothy |
Yamamoto |