Our special Spring 2008 / Mother’s Day issue is now available at www.trellismagazine.com/CurrentIssueHome.html.  This issue features the winners of the Mother’s Day poetry contest as well as a special bonus section featuring many other Mother-themed poems.  I hope you enjoy reading the magazine.  Trellis will no longer be able to be printed directly from the website.  If you want a printed copy of the magazine, we ask that you order one.  Please ask for discounts if you are ordering large quantities. 

Thank you to everyone who submitted poetry for the Trellis Magazine Mother’s Day Poetry Contest.  We received many wonderful poems that touched the hearts of the staff and the Judges.  The Judges were very impressed with the ability of the writers to express their sentiments in a variety of poetic forms.  They have awarded these prizes:
First Place:  “Sepia Photo – One Room Schoolhouse, 1917” (Meditative Ode) by Liz Dolan
Second Place:  “In the Oncology Ward” (Rondeau) by Allison Joseph
Third Place:  “I am My Mother’s Daughter” (Irish Quatrains) by RJ Clarken
Student Book Prize:  “Sacagawea” (Sestets) by Adria M. Olson, 8th grade
Honorable Mentions:
“Her Style” (Sonnet) by Gretchen Fletcher
“Indebtedness of Sons” (Rhyme Royal) by Michael Samford
“The Brat” (Quatrains) by Bob Dalton
 “A Friend Forever” (Tercets) by Shilpa Agrawal
“missing you on mother’s day” (Letter-Poem) by Avisha Thakkar, 8th grade
         The prize-winning poems will be published in the Spring magazine (coming soon).  For this special contest, many other poems were selected by the Judges for the Mother’s Day Poet Recognition Award, and those poems will be published in bonus pages of the Spring magazine.  The Spring magazine will make a great Mother’s Day gift.  Go to the Current Issue section of the website and look for “COMING SOON” for instructions on pre-ordering a Spring magazine now to be mailed in time for Mother’s Day.

April is National Poetry Month!  It was started in 1996 by the Academy of American Poets to celebrate the place of poetry in our society.  Their website has some great (and free) ideas on how to incorporate poetry into your life every day this month.  I think my favorite one is to subscribe to a literary journal…hint hint.  

Trellis has put together a list of websites you can visit to get more information and resources on National Poetry month:

Academy of American Poets (who originated national poetry month) http://www.poets.org/page.php/prmID/41
Calendar of some poetry month events http://www.poets.org/calendar.php/varClear/1
Poem in Your Pocket Day http://www.poets.org/page.php/prmID/406
Infoplease’s poetry month suggestions and fun quizzes http://www.infoplease.com/spot/pmonth1.html
Library of Congress poetry site http://www.loc.gov/poetry/
Education World - how to compile a book of your own poems, and invent a new poetic form http://www.education-world.com/a_curr/curr079.shtml
Scholastic’s poetry month resources for teachers http://teacher.scholastic.com/poetry/index.htm?os_id=os4-google-April-NationalPoetryMonth-National_Poetry_Month
Meadowbrook Press’s poetry teachers site http://www.poetryteachers.com/
National Poet Laureates http://www.world-class-poetry.com/poet_laureate.html
State Poet Laureates http://www.loc.gov/rr/main/poets/current.html
How to become a poet laureate http://www.loc.gov/rr/main/poets/faq.html

In addition, I thought it would be fun to start sharing instances of poetry in everyday life.  I just got back from a trip to Boston where I visited Mt. Auburn cemetery.  Not only is the cemetary one of the impetuses for creating America’s public parks, it is the final resting place for some of the nation’s famous poets including Oliver Wendell Holmes, Amy Lowell and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.  I recommend visiting there if you are ever near Boston but I would wait until the summer if I were you.  This poem by John Greenleaf Whittier was on the side of the chapel.  He actually wrote this as an inscription for a sundial:

If you have any pictures you want to share, feel free to email them to me and I’ll post them on the blog.

In honor of our villanelle contest, I have composed my own villanelle for the occasion:

The villanelle is here to stay.
No matter how the critics taunt it
All other forms will fade away.

Even though I’ve heard my friends like donkeys bray
That every good poem is also a sonnet,
The villanelle is here to stay.

I try and try to write a breton lay
But by another form my pen is haunted.
All other forms will fade away

Into the night, I can see the truth as clear as day
And I don’t need to flaunt it:
The villanelle is here to stay.

It has such a subtle, quiet way
That beside its gentle wit
All other forms will fade away.

Like a bouffant without hairspray,
Sestinas, haikus and limericks fall flat and quit.
The villanelle is here to stay.
All other forms will fade away.

Okay, it’s not that great but it totally follows all of the rules…except for a consistent meter.  I know all of you can do much better and I expect the entries to our villanelle contest to be great!  Take a look at the rules on our contest page to see what categories of villanelles we will be accepting.  There are also links to a lot of other villanelles.  The advice and practice way at the bottom of the page is especially helpful if you haven’t written a villanelle before.  Writing a rhyming couplet first and then building on it is probably the easiest way to start and that’s how I wrote my poem.  It kind of felt like building a house by stacking a deck of cards…a little precarious at first but easier with practice.  The deadline isn’t until May 30th so that should give you plenty of time to perfect your own poems.  If you have any advice to share with other writers, please post a comment.
On a related note, judging for the Mother’s day contest is almost finished so anyone who entered that contest should hear the results by the end of next week at the latest.  I really enjoyed reading all of the poems.  Thank you to all of the authors for sharing their work.  This was some of the most emotional poetry that we’ve received.

I’m glad you’re here.  This is the brand new companion blog to Trellis Magazine.  One of our goals at Trellis is to make the process of submitting to the magazine as easy and transparent as possible.  I’ll be posting updates about contests, submissions information, news, interesting poetry facts and of course, poetry!  Blogging is new to me so I’ll do my best to keep it both fun and informative. 

 If you have any suggestions of things you would like to see here, please send me an email at editor@trellismagazine.com.