Lauren Burchell
Last updated: Monday, May 2, 2022 at 8:28 PM
Lauren Burchell, who rose to the top of more than 100 entries, will read from his works Saturday, May 14th from 1-3pm in the Orangery on BCCC's Newtown Campus.
Lauren Burchell, a junior at Central Bucks High School West, has been named the 2022 Bucks County High School Poet of the Year, officials at Bucks County Community College announced. Burchell rose to the top of more than 100 entries in the 35rd annual contest, part of the Bucks County Poet Laureate Program administered by the college.
For the first-place finish, Burchell wins $300 and will be honored with a poetry reading on Saturday, May 14, from 1-3 pm in the Orangery on BCCC's Newtown Campus. The event will feature winners, finalists, and judges. The three poems Burchell submitted for the contest were entitled “One Fish, Two Fish, Girl Fish, Boy Fish,” “Secondary Succession,” and “An Ode to Selene.” The judges were Nicole Steinberg (the current Bucks County Poet Laureate) and Jane Edna Mohler (last year's BCPL).
In addition to the winner, the judges also named Rhianna Searle, a junior at the George School, as first runner-up. Second runner-up was junior Mira Kaufman from Council Rock High School North. Third runner-up was Pearl Smith, also a junior, from Neshaminy High School.
The three runners-up will also read from their works during the celebration.
The annual Bucks County High School Poet of the Year contest is another way that Bucks County Community College contributes to the cultural heritage of the region. To learn more, visit bucks.edu/poets.
For more information contact Dr. Ethel Rackin, a Professor of Language and Literature at Bucks and the director of the Wordsmiths Reading Series and Poet Laureate Program. Ethel.Rackin@bucks.edu
Lauren Burchell’s winning poems:
One Fish, Two Fish, Girl Fish, Boy Fish
I. One Fish
Sometimes I wish I’d cut off my hair by my own hand,
stuck the soil-colored strands into a used plastic grocery bag
(reducing, reusing, recycling)
Threw it into a river, let the evidence float away on a current
Maybe the bag will become some
unfortunate fish’s last supper
But dear God, at least I’d be alive
If all I have to do to survive is secondhandedly strangle
a fish, then I’d gladly take on the title of killer
I’ve already murdered my past self:
she’s at the bottom of a murky lake now
(I haven’t been to a lake in years)
II. Two Fish
My mother had three children, braided her iron spirit into our hair
When we were just ripening, she’d take us
everywhere, anywhere, just to get out of the house
(apples never straying far from the tree)
One of our most frequented places
was a paradise of a koi pond hidden
inside a health center or hospital or…
(I wasn’t particular about that sort of thing a decade ago)
But we each chose our favorite fish, tried to find them every time
My mother’s pointing finger led our eyes to them
My favorite was an inseparable pair; their markings burning softly
through the dappled surface of the water
I rarely needed my mother’s murmurs to identify them,
for their uniqueness was what I wished to copy,
something to make me stand out from my sisters
(I didn’t know then I would grow up
to look nothing like them)
But lifespans become cramped within the confines of the indoors
And as a shadow fell over the pond, I could not find my pair of fish
I was inconsolable on the inside; the only crack in my façade
was a tremble of my lips and a stone in my throat
Within a few seconds, my mother pointed out two beautiful fish,
claiming that they were my favorites, child
Did she craft her lie to ease the trouble on my face, or
had she never paid enough attention to know the difference?
That was the first lie she told me that I did not believe
The first lie that fell apart like a sandcastle
built too close to the tide’s reaching fingers
III. Girl Fish
There are plenty of fish in the sea
but how many girl fish are there?
How many girl fish are there that like other girl fish
that might be boy fish?
I cast my line, wait for eternity, reel it in,
feel my skin burn and peel under the yellow smudge of the sun
Empty-handed, I change my bait, becoming desperate
I cut off my fingers one by one, hoping they like my ring finger best
Impale the digit with the hook, then cast my line again
Perhaps if I tempt them with the right part of my flesh they will bite
But girl fish only steal my bait for themselves
I offer these slices of skin just to be robbed
Never learning, always hoping the outcome might change
Girl fish slip out of your hands before you can get a grip
Swimming upstream as you are swept into the rushing tide
Never yours to treasure, to admire
Though they’ll take whatever skin you offer up
IV. Boy Fish
I observe boys like they are rare fish
and I am the most dedicated ichthyologist
in the last aquarium left standing
I watch the way they arrange their legs when they sit at desks
(only crossed if at the ankle,
or wide open,
or with an ankle on an opposing knee)
And how they position their hands when they’re talking
(shoved deep into pockets,
or clasped at one wrist,
or all over me)
And how their clothes tumble down their torsos
(flatly across their chest to their stomach)
And yet I’m the one encased in hollow glass
Strangers staring at me like I’m going extinct
The water is pooling around my knees,
enticing me to sink like a stone
I am the freak show, I am the exhibit
and my captor is my body
Secondary Succession
(n.) when organisms return to living in an area that was destroyed
by events like floods, wildfires, or breakups
If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one around to hear it,
is it even on fire? Are its veiny leaves
slowly curling into char? Are its twisting branches
cracking off, adding fuel to the fire,
the most vicious of cycles?
If you’re not around to call me beautiful,
am I still a vessel of beauty?
Or is it only someone else’s eyes that can
create my allure? Because my toothpaste-spattered bathroom mirror
plays tricks on me so often
So was the only thing that made me handsome
your lovely, lying lips?
But now, you have left me without the heat of them
So maybe I’m on fire, maybe I’m not
Maybe you’re a liar, maybe I am
You witnessed when I fell in love with you; I heard it
when you fell out of love with me:
the melody of a heartbeat slowly steadying; then flatlining
altogether as you rip the cuff off
I hope I didn’t cut off your blood flow, darling
Look: my knuckles are red, too,
I held on so tightly to your fire that the pain was all-consuming
until it was just burning me raw
I tried to cup you in my palms like you were cool water
but my hands were imperfectly made, see,
You slipped out of my grasp like an oil spill
while my heart was doused in acetone
An Ode to Selene
My sister and I, we watched the moon rise
Marveling at how quickly it leapt above the horizon
I said it was orange, she argued for yellow
but the honey shade dripped on, oblivious to our squabbling
Our neighbors wandered by us, peeking curiously
at two kids crouched in a ditch, eyes fixed on the heavens
They couldn’t find the cloudy marble rolling around in the sky
until our murmured directions guided their gaze
My father meandered down the street with an amber bottle
swinging, pendulum-like in his loose grasp,
his eyes unfocused and his embrace warm
The moon above commanded silence, a quiet awe
broken not even by the croak of frogs or hum of insects
For nature gives the moon the stage when she is full and golden,
a handful of minutes in a pair of fortnights
Until she breaks above the tree line, snapping us out of our trance,
and all fall back into our lives