2023 Making History Come Alive Through Words Poetry Competition Winners
Chicago Collections Consortium, in partnership with Chicago Public Library Harold Washington Library Center and the Poetry Foundation, was proud to host a reception on 5/23 for the 2023 winners of Making History Come Alive Through Words poetry competition. The competition was first launched in 2022 in celebration of CCC's 10th anniversary and asks Chicagoland high school students to excite their curiosity and creativity by visiting EXPLORE CHICAGO COLLECTIONS portal and writing a poem inspired by what they find.
2023 Jurors for the competition included: Mary Case, Co-founder Chicago Collections Consortium and Dean Emerita, University of Illinois Chicago University Library (Humanities; Information and Computing Sciences; Social Science); Katherine Litwin, Library Director, Poetry Foundation, and Kenyatta Rogers, Poet, The Chicago High School for the Arts, Faculty Member, and co-host of the Sunday Reading Series with Simone Muench.
CCC is proud to recognize the following students for their outstanding poems:
Jada Rodriguez, William Howard Taft High School
Mira Schroeder, William Howard Taft High School
Justin Simpson, Kenwood Academy High School
Estelle Wong, William Fremd High School
Nora Wunsch, Jones College Prep
Honorable mention - Ginevra Kellogg, William Howard Taft High School
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Jada Rodriguez, William Howard Taft High School
https://explore.chicagocollections.org/image/uchicago/94/f766s2n/
Her red coat
I watch the women's red coat as it shields her from the storm, Her heel prints as she leaves them behind in the snow, Smelling as her winter scent follows after her in the wind.
My boots crunch leaving behind sloppy footsteps
My bags hang on each side of me while I struggle to stand upright, My gray coat is as gloomy as the dark sky.
I watch her as we walk down the Michigan Avenue Bridge. The traffic moves along the quiet streets
I walk faster to make it in time so I do not miss my train.
We go our separate ways,
I lose sight of her red coat
But the thought of her lingers in my mind The women's red coat
Like the Shield of Achilles
Protecting her from the storm
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Mira Schroeder William Howard Taft High School
https://explore.chicagocollections.org/image/uic/59/tb0z11k/
1 South Wacker
I walk down the street approach the train stop no destination in mind.
I walk in and tap my card
at the little machine.
As I walk through the gates, The lady stares at me.
I think to myself “ I'd stare at people all day too.”
All different kinds of people ride public transport
they each have their own stories,
and this is mine
I get on the train
find a seat near the back
This man in front of me reads a newspaper with a huge skyscraper on it, the caption reads
“1 South Wacker".
my attention drawn to the beautiful architecture.
My mind was lost and mesmerized
by the big glass windows and odd form
a futuristic design for its time
and still to this day adds
to the urbanization of chicago
realizing I'm still on the train and have made it to the heart of the loop.
I jolt up and look out the window,
I feel the train roughly stop
I quickly get myself together. I step onto the train platform walk down the stairs and out the train stop.
I find myself wandering for a couple blocks before
I'm met
with the most breathtaking piece of history
1 South Wacker.
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Justin Simpson, Kenwood Academy High School
https://explore.chicagocollections.org/records/?f1-topics=Events%20%26%20Movements::1919%20race%20riot
Chicago’s Blood
Placed in broken-up sections of what should be a happy home
Then break the spirit like a raw bone
The kitchenette then breaks
Burning crosses at the stake
Ashes and black blood flow into the lake
Same blood that redlined us
On the documents
same red undermined us
Coax me, kill me, cash me
Anything to get past me
Redlining redlining!
Red summer
City blood stained
No more the Yankees
My dearest stoned in the waves down under
Black churches tinted red, but naught of wine.
The religion we turn to is naught sanctified
Black people ain't meant to burn
Redlining Redlining!
The kitchenettes burnt out
Throw those blacks to the south side
They can all drown in Bronzeville
Let them croak where they reside
Bronze-tinted black haven
Of course, they're gonna hate it
We ought to fight their craft beer and martini bars to save it
But it's awful too late for saving
They preyed on this land since they threw it at our feet to start grazing
Lease Me Loot me let me die out
No health or recreation centers
So the boys are always out
Bloodshed all about
The grand plan
Turn it to a warzone
Before we clear it out
This is the modern day
Redlining redlining!
We up the stake more than two-fold
134 percent up, we're no lincoln park
but we sure struck gold
Man the story never gets old
Uninvest and reinvest
By the power vested in me
We shall see the Bronzeville
One day filled with more white
than actual bronze
More salad bars with croutons
Fewer schools and
Even less help for those we deem far gone
But which road should we place this bar on?
Redlining Redlining!!
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Estelle Wong, William Fremd High School
https://explore.chicagocollections.org/image/uic/29/z60c21v/
The Year of the Dragon in Chinatown
Chinatown, Chinatown, Chinatown
I repeat your name like a praying chant
You started as a refuge carved out for shunned immigrants
And now you are a home to those near and far
Your name evokes the heritage of a persistent people
Whose legacy was born across the stars
Chinatown, Chinatown, Chinatown
I repeat your name like a praying chant
Here you are now
You take the form of a lion’s dance
Flowing like the movements of a fierce, rushing river
You grant the fortune of another lunar year’s chance
Chinatown, Chinatown, Chinatown
I repeat your name like a praying chant
You forged an identity out of contradictions
As a representation of the spirit of both old anew
Where the worlds of East and West intersect
Yet constantly. You blended and bridged the two
Chinatown, Chinatown, Chinatown
I repeat your name like a praying chant
For you breath like a living dragon
Your heart pounds with the bustle of people and business,
You sing the metaphors of a hundred different tongues
Your blood roars with ancient history and cultural richness
Chinatown, Chinatown, Chinatown
Repeated five times and more,
I realized such the truth:
You are a community to the world
A home for all, for the elders and the youth
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Nora Wunsch, Jones College Prep
https://explore.chicagocollections.org/image/uic/107/c53g62w/
Men on the Moon
somewhere up there
in the swirling void
is a man doing the impossible.
he bounds over mountains and craters
carved into the moon's face from millions of years of solitude.
but somewhere down here a child screams,
and when the day ends, the balloons fall back down to earth.
my mother goes back to her ironing and my father lights another cigar
before sprinkling the ashes onto a carpet she has to clean.
the tv flickers to life and armstrong yells,
“one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind”.
my father cuffs me on the back of the head before leaving for the galway arms
like he does after every bears game, win or lose,
leaving me and my mom to keep food warm
so when he staggers home he can eat.
mom looks out the window up to the sky
and i know what she is thinking.
she is wondering if life is better up there,
and if in another universe she gets a degree
and someone else makes her dinner.
i don't tell her that it is she who is doing the impossible
in the swirling void.
she bounds over my brothers grave
and holes in the pavement
she patches up my scraped knees
and weathers my father's heavy hand and heart
somewhere down here,
is a woman doing the impossible.
thirty years later when my father has died from congestive heart failure,
i will drive my mother to the community college
and she will enroll in astronomy 101
________________________________________
Ginevra Kellogg , William Howard Taft High School
https://explore.chicagocollections.org/image/newberry/115/4j0c32s/
Chicago Fire Wreckage
Everything is gone
Serenity to terror in a matter of hours
Flames like knives
Piercing through towns
What is left for there to see
As nothing was left be
The aftermath of dust
Ash pervades the air
Nothing is left untouched
Houses have lamented
Rubble caps the ground
Everything is gone
Broken and destroyed
What is there left to see
Everything is gone
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