Gival Press announced that George Klawitter of Notre Dame, Indiana has won the 19th Annual Oscar Wilde Award-2020 for his poem titled Twenty. Michael Rodman last year’s winner served as the judge, who read the entrees anonymously.
George Klawitter received a cash prize of $500.00 and his poem is published at Gival Press websites.
About the Author
George Klawitter, retired professor of English (St. Edward’s University), has edited the poetry of Richard Barnfield and published The Enigmatic Narrator, a study of John Donne’s poetry. His poems have been printed in various journals including The James White Review, Poetry Northwest, Poet Lore, Evergreen Chronicles, Milkweed, and Cumberland Poetry Review. His first book of poetry, Country Matters, appeared in 2001. His book Let Orpheus Take Your Hand won the Gival Press Poetry Award in 2002. His book of poetry The Agony of Words appeared in 2004, and his book of poetry Gareth came out in 2014. A volume of sonnets (The Priest) will appear in late summer 2020.
Winner of the 19th Gival Press Oscar Wilde Award-2020
Twenty
As a doctor, he’ll know the secrets of the heart: when it skips a beat he’ll sense the truths of chemistry, he’ll chart the rise and fall of close encountering.
I saw him once, a man of no regrets, take poetry, dissect it clean and neat, squeeze metaphor, take simile apart, then smile in simple pride, a flowering.
He’s rather like a daffodil in snow, caught between reality and promise: he dances in the cold of wild dreams.
My only luck is to watch him grow, pentameter at hand, a sweet surprise jetéd into my life of ifs and seems.
Copyright © 2020 by George Klawitter.
Finalists
Marsha P. Johnson Is Arrested for the One-Hundred-and-First, and Last, Time by Arnaldo Batista of Dania, Florida.
When I Realized I Was a Green Tree Frog in Another Life by Grant Chemidlin of Los Angeles, California.
Acetate Love by Natasha Dennerstain of Oakland, California.
Love Potion #9 (Revisited) by Octavio Gonzalez of Wellesley, Massachusetts.
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