First Prize

Anne laughed at me today, the tone of her voice lovely yet still it invaded the chambers of my heart. She meant it humorously, the way she pointed to the chips in my sculpture and accused me of making the holes myself.

I tried to tell her the clay shaped itself in the same way water finds pathways under rocks compacted in mud. I tried to tell her the mosaic shards, in various tenors of blue and grey, arranged themselves to mimic the fluctuating tones in a shadow that lies across and so moves with the rippling grass.

I tried to tell her about movement and fluidity and control. I tried to articulate the things you told my hands and the dreams you inspired in my eye, but Anne, she laughed and, where her eyes were mirthful, there was no understanding.

She does not feel your pull the way I do, the way your hollow insides hold the moon and pulse with the Milky Way. She does not see the way your cracks are portals to alien galaxies where once you roared and fed on stars.