Out of more than 2500 entries, a poem from Kinross Wolaroi School year 9 student Maddie Hook has won a coveted prize in Red Room Poetry’s national poetry competition, Object Poetry.
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Maddie’s poem Mahogany Bones was awarded the REX Prize, for an outstanding poem submitted by a secondary school student from regional area.
The poem infuses a piano with the soul of a fictional dead grandfather and the judges commented on the integration of music, the vivid imagery of wooden bones, and the rhythms and repetitions of the piece “so akin to a piano refrain”.
I like slam poetry because it sounds like music.
- Maddie Hook
The 15-year-old said she wrote the poem in a rhythm-based slam poetry style that she learnt about this year and enjoyed more than traditional styles such as sonnets.
“I like slam poetry because it sounds like music,” Maddie said.
She said she also enjoyed the creative challenge of writing the poem.
“I’m pretty competitive, I like a challenge,” Maddie said.
Her teacher Serena Lewis said she was initially surprised when Maddie’s poem was shortlisted.
“It made me re-read the poem and I thought she’s in with a chance,” Mrs Lewis said.
A poem by fellow Kinross Wolaroi School student Lila Pearce was also shortlisted in the competition.
Mahogany Bones
When the piano-maker crafted my grandfather
Gently bending his mahogany bones
He was not constructing, he was creating
Bringing him to life,
He gave to me a guardian
With a life most complicated
Whose love never outdated
But who now lies in the ground ill-fated.
When I was young, I’d dance upon his golden feet.
Neat, petite, my path to the afterlife.
They sat there, quaint, to prolong the sound
Of the piano, but could not prolong his life.
My grandfather’s laugh roars and groans,
Rattling his mahogany bones
Like stones
And the tones of his voice echo as he sings,
The sounds flowing grandly through his strings.
Mother pats my head and smiles and says, 'My dear, Pa’s dead, you see.'
But as I close my eyes, hold his ivory hands, the music shapes his face
And I face the fact that though he’s gone, she’s wrong
He’s still here with me.
The notes he sings, changing in modulation
A complication of detailed intonations and different tongues
For the songs of others whose remain unsung.
My grandfather’s laugh roars and groans
Rattling his mahogany bones
Like stones
And the tones that he sings makes the music truly sting
I know now, he soars with new wings.
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Tanya Marschke
I am based at Orange and cover a wide range of subjects as well as the weekly business column. I've worked consistently in the the media industry since 2006 including the past seven years at the Central Western Daily. Before moving to Orange, I worked as a journalist at weekly newspapers the Beaudesert Times and the Gold Coast Sun in Queensland, as well as the Scone Advocate in the Hunter Valley. I started my career at the Ridge News in Lightning Ridge while I completed my journalism studies remotely at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst.
I am based at Orange and cover a wide range of subjects as well as the weekly business column. I've worked consistently in the the media industry since 2006 including the past seven years at the Central Western Daily. Before moving to Orange, I worked as a journalist at weekly newspapers the Beaudesert Times and the Gold Coast Sun in Queensland, as well as the Scone Advocate in the Hunter Valley. I started my career at the Ridge News in Lightning Ridge while I completed my journalism studies remotely at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst.
