New Orleans Public Library
African American Resource Center
Tom Dent Literary Festival
November 6-8, 2003

2003 Langston Hughes Poetry Contest Winners

THIRD PLACE WINNER

Langston
by Evan D. Cleaver of New Orleans, LA via Kansas City, KS; Dillard University student

my poetry is music

a jazz tune of angelic altos over harlem
an opus of my soul
my music too sings America
i write choruses for darker sistas to harmonize
a ragtime poem for brothas to charleston with

my poetry is sunshine

stretches rays bright enough to lift dark loads
warm enough to wake a dream deferred
ink shines to rise raisins in the sun

my poetry is color

Miles Davis kind of blue
a rainbow of art
i write pure paint over cotton canvas
my colors have grown deep like the rivers
& those rivers rain Langston Hughes
                                                  by hues

Back to 2003 Langston Hughes Poetry Contest Winners

Back to Tom Dent Literary Festival, 2003