On June 6, 2025, the Manitoba Writers Guild Celebrated the Winners of the 2025 Rabindranath Tagore Poetry Competition.
- First place: “Rhodesia,” Sean Philips
- Second place: ”1950, 1980, 2020,” Taryn Fenez
- Third place: “Oh, Dear Cat Lady,” Jennifer Tesoro (T. J. Evangelista)
- Honourable mentions: “This Older Dude Over at Conchita’s Up North Main This Morning,” Mitchell Toews, and “Still,” Julia Rempel.
Please read the winning poems below:
Rhodesia (Sean Philips)
In Matabeleland the Jacarandas are in full bloom.
Purple confetti falling gently over rich red soil.
Soft, and wet, and delicious
between your naked toes.
Dipping white bread crusts in milky sweet tea
served in thin pale green porcelain tin plates and cups
in the afternoon shade of the giant mango:
Reuben the gardener, Selena the nanny, John the cook.
In the African way, bundled
in a colourful blanket tied around the waist
Chubby little body pressed tight asleep.
My brother’s pink face in the nape of her dark brown neck.
Sunday lunch. On the table a little brass bell.
John, I assume, just sitting and waiting,
brings in the roast and gravy when it rings.
Elbows off the table. Napkin on your lap.
Birds of paradise that could poke your eye out,
Heavy quartz rocks placed perfectly along the path.
A lawn that needs constant watering. And Reuben
in blue overalls, sweating to keep up appearances.
Fresh lemons for the lemonade ladies
in wide brimmed floppy hats and sundresses.
Gathered in the shade of the veranda
To complain about the heat.
The men by the fire, smoking
in safari suits, pale blue or yellow,
drink fast and deep and long into the night.
Somebody has to keep watch.
Saturday. Mixed doubles on clay, followed
by mixed doubles in the Lion’s club bar. (Canada Dry for the kids.)
Everyone in white. Very polite.
I heard They broke through the compound fence last night.
They cut off her lips, and made him eat them.
Blood and skin and teeth and sinew
every seven years they say, we are made anew.
When I was a child,
I was made of Africa.
In Matabeleland the Jacarandas are in full bloom.
Purple confetti falls gently over rich red soil.
Soft, and wet, and delicious, but take care
there are bees inside the fallen flowers.
Our Thesean ship makes landfall with the storm at the Cape of Good Hope.
Broken pines, and shards of glass litter black tar streets.
No more walking barefoot.
1950, 1980, 2020 (Taryn Fenez)
Sous l’œil des maitres bornés, les règles renforcées
Vitement, ma grand mère hides her books
Cowering under their disapproving looks
Ils sont lourds dans sa gorge, ces mots avalés.
La lutte interminable de Louis
Ne termine pas avec les gens qui fuient
Mais pour elle l’espoir est absente
Avec toutes ces règles oppressantes.
La langue maternelle réservé
Pour l’amitié et la parenté.
La honte de l’altérité en orbite,
Qui efface ses syllabes interdites
…
Une langue trop proche pour être comprise,
Trop lointain pour être parlée.
The words flow with the breeze,
A familial echo, which my dad betrays.
When ses parents have something to hide
They quickly switch le langage
When he’s in trouble, they always decide
Sur une punition sans assemblage
He tried to take classes,
Mais enfin c’est peine perdu
He will just join the masses
Et à sa place, ses enfants s’évertuent.
…
And so the pendulum swings
And I become le résultat mélangé
D’une espérance si mince
D’une population très censurée
“Blood is thicker than water”
Mais même si nous partageons le sang
Even though I am too, their daughter
Nous n’avons pas le même accent
Je suis un pont entre deux rives
Bâtie sur des silences et des espoirs
I am not about to give up and leave
Cette place qui a, rightfully, devenu mon perchoir.
Oh, Dear Cat Lady (Jennifer Tesoro)
I see you
stricken and cemented there
strung tightly, wound to spot
where your humanity hangs on final spooled thread
to you, a powered play of tiger and man
for them, a petit play of cockroach and mice
tied tongues
they see her shouldered pain consume
as they turn and walk away de-throned
push that down
sickly stomached, feigned repair
alley-soaked vestments for unhoused waifs
ranting storylines brimmed with unconditional feline adoration overflow
to them, a vicious mind hell contaminating lives perfected
for you, a vital lifeline grasping at rays asunder
paralleled pathways
she feels their eyes burrowing judgement
as she caters sofrayı kurmak* street hospitality
* * *
once, long ago
a queen of heirs
feminine allure, head held high
confident runway Milan with magnetic Manolo Blahnik swagger, she
moved through rooms, spreadable butter on dry brittle crowds
strong twinkle eyes servicing social demands and mountained expectations
quintessentially cultured
her backbone supple from day-to-day turbulence
as accolades purred and petted polished palettes
tomorrow’s lifetimes blurred
cataracts torrential, cauterised prayers
bedclothes turned bawdily; thorough despair
smoke and velvet cloak nervous conditions of yesteryear
feral citizenry as illusive as stray souls themselves: uncountable
for real are these unknowns: hundreds? thousands? millions? …plus?
ancestral damnation
as Destiny bleeds post-cat-fight claret prophecies
I lynx toward endearment; furred kitty warmth
This Older Dude Over at Conchita’s Up North Main This Morning (Mitchell Toews)
Dude’s THE KIND of shitkicker who doesn’t go in for politics much
At least not the red-faced F-bomb rodeos that are popular online
But this slim dude over at Conchita’s sure did have some opinions…
Like, for example, what Cormac McCarthy—
apparently one of this dude’s writing heroes—
wrote in The Passenger, a roundhouse kick of a book about squaring up with,
“you know Who…” (Dude looks up, way-way up)
“In there,” the dude says, “Cormac writes, gender has meaning,”
and adds, in no uncertain, wabi-sabi terms,
“That’s how a lot of McCarthy’s best stuff is,
simple but with all the kick of a Cooey single-action.”
Then, slow and low through bruised, smiling lips…
“I don’t know much about religion,
but I’m damn sure God doesn’t care whether
you got a male soul or a female soul… so long as you got a kind soul.”
Then with a loud scrape, like an exclamation mark on the wood floor
the dude rises up about six-foot somethin’, says, “Kiss, kiss,”
leaves a Toonie under the saucer,
offers a hat tip in humble supplication to Ms. Conchita, and departs…
But not before their long, clean, pointed, bright red, “Silent Scream” fingernails
tweeze out a single toothpick from their shirt pocket,
and aim it for that burrito shred next to their upper left canine
Still (Julia Rempel)
She crumbles neath the load
not daring to drop the tiny bundle.
Blanket, old and torn.
She needs it too much,
still.
It is still,
cold and hard.
Still
she clings, unable to let go.
Legs bent under her,
flesh worn
as the blanket.
Head & arms bent over
to protect the bundle,
still
in her lap.
The night comes.
In that in between space,
her body does not
have the fluid for tears.
Unmoved that she is forgotten
by history,
remembered no more.
No longer hearing
the shouts, the crying, the weary steps of
the others.
There are no family,
friends, strangers
or enemies.
There is nothing left to feel,
not anger, sorrow,
or love.
Still,
clinging to the bundle,
she is still.
In the morning,
the trucks collecting the
still
collect her
& bury her so deep in the pile
the dirt does not reach her,
with her promise
never to let the child go
still.
