Yale-ĀŅĀ׊ć Medical & Engineering Studentsā Poetry Competition 2017-2018: Announcement of Winners!
16 May 2018
The winners of the 2017 Yale-ĀŅĀ׊ć Medical & Engineering Studentsā poetry competition have been announced! There were over 90 entries this year and the judging panel were delighted by the standard of poetry as well as the range of themes written upon.
The results are:
First place, Ā£1000: Kristina Brown (Yale Medicine) with āC¾±³Ł²¹ā
Joint second place, Ā£500 each: Sabie Rainton (ĀŅĀ׊ć Medicine) with āThe Jungleā and Olivia Pang (ĀŅĀ׊ć Medicine) with āK±š²Ō²Ō±š³Ł³óā
Highly commended: Muhammad Yusoff (ĀŅĀ׊ć Medicine) with āfall and an insomniacās tankaā
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The poetry competition was launched in February 2011 by Professor John Martin (ĀŅĀ׊ć Professor in Cardiovascular Medicine) who is the co-director of the Yale-ĀŅĀ׊ć Collaborative. The competition is for medical and engineering students at both universities and is student run with this yearās competition being organised by Amrita DāSouza (ĀŅĀ׊ć Medicine).
The competition was born in the hope of inspiring, nurturing and promoting the humanities within medical education and to help provide an outlet for students.
- Winner: Krisina Brown (Yale Medicine)
Cita
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I notice her hands first: the contrast is stark as the dark cattle against the snow-covered hillside
on the drive here. The way home lies somewhere between wintry wonderland and wishful thinking
Itās been three and a half months since I saw her last, since I left this small town world behind
for medical school, and already, her hands have changed:Ģż
The same hands that once spun stories on Saturdays
fingertips darting details into every account of my childhood
The hands I watched transform when I was a teenager
when she returned from the hospital in a wheelchair and those hands
once dazzling creatures, sat limp and swollen in her lap
I held those hands when the days grew long, extra squeezes when I couldnāt find the words
when I started calling her Cita, her favorite nickname, my way of saying
āMother, I have not forgotten how tall you once stood but I cherish you all the more nowā
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Hers are the hands that I saw get better, helped to button up pink pajamas
Watched flutter skywards in laughter. Now her left hand does the talking, quietly
Her right hand rests across her chest as though protecting some subtle ache
āC¾±³Ł²¹-ā this time Cita is a question I donāt know how to ask. She explains sheās just a little cold
I marvel at the details she omits. I wonder if she feels the chill of my absence
I notice the thin film of gravel on the hardwood, remnants of all her trips to the lake without me
The comet tails of her wheelchair tracks sweep past the coffee table, past the cranberry sofa
where I once fell asleep sometime in college and woke up to catch her staring
in a voice marbled by tears, she told me, āI donāt remember the last time I got to watch you sleeping
You looked just the way you did when you were a babyā
She looked at me as though I didnāt know what itās like to miss someone
whoās right in front of me. She looks at me the same way now
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Although I stand before her, there is still a departure plane ticket lingering in the air
like the last leaf of November, a breath of New Haven at the ends of my sentences
She is hurting. I can tell by the single tug at the corner of her rose petal lips
And those hands. Try as I might, I cannot uncurl those fingers
cannot un-clench arm from chest. I wonder how she can hold on to so much heartache
I wish she knew the sweet rush of weightlessness that comes with letting go
Even in her sleep, she holds that hand to her chest as if in remembrance
of the puttering of a newbornās heartbeat against her own
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On my last day of Thanksgiving break, I wash her face, humming under my breath
She tells me my voice doesnāt sound the same over the phone. āCita,ā I say, as an apology
Later that day we sit together reading our books, mirroring each other:
glasses on, fresh stories before us, a plate of oranges between us
She tells me, āI wish I could read my book and eat oranges with you forever.ā We share a smile
Weeks later I return home for winter break. Cita awakens to the sunrise and the scratchy yawn of the front door. I find her swaddled in pink sheets, hair as dark as a dreamless night
āCita I am here,ā I say when it is clear her eyes have not yet convinced her
Suddenly, both of her storyteller hands outstretch to greet me
her smile disintegrates in tears as her cheeks turn to soft clay in my hands.
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Kristina describes āC¾±³Ł²¹ā, the winning poem, as āmy tribute to home and all it encompasses: my motherās indelible strength in her experience with chronic illness and the ways in which both time and distance have shaped our relationship"
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- Joint second: Sabie Rainton (ĀŅĀ׊ć Medicine)
The Jungle
Reflections on the Calais āJungleā, Summer 2016
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Tent city, sitting pretty, lulling on the sand dunes,
Underneath a summer moon,
Under winter sun and hell-fire rain,
Come wind, come frost, come summer again.
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A caged-in prison of monitored freedom,
Bustling within the confines of the nervous police lines.
Township of potential, saviour of hope,
Life and detention, tarpaulin and rope.
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Little Iraq, Little Afghanistan, Little Syria,
Not at all littler, but a thousand times fiercer,
Pockets of community, mint tea, black tea,
Black coffee, but always enough to share.
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No oneās āforeverā, but everyoneās āright nowā,
United like never before āgainst the drag of the plough.Ģż
Completely divided, unique, unspeakably brave.
A thousand lifetimes of stories,
A thousand reminders of the grave.
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The weather comes and goes but the wanderers remain,
Teetering barely between safe and slain.
Rain of cold, and dark, and rubber bullets
Soak everything through but always knew it
Wouldnāt, couldnāt stem the fight
Of souls whoāll chance it, cloaked in night.
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The land of hope, with iron fist,
The undulating morning mist,
The chants of āgoā, āturn backā and ānoā
From those whose young have chance to growĢż
No resting place of brick and mortar
For rest-in-peace your son and daughter.
The drive of fear, the chance youāll take
With nothing left to put at stake.
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The world cheek-turns, shrugs shoulders, sighs,
For weathered faces, sunken eyes,
Told stories through a printed page
Numb-minded past the point of rage.
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āItās sad, but what else can we do?ā
But what it ātheyā werenāt āthemā but āyouā?
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Describing her poem, Sabie explains āI visited the Calais Jungle/Dzanghal with a team of medics in 2016. It was aĢżprofound experience that had a massive impact on me. The campĢżwas definitely a thing of beauty and disaster, an entire settlement growing completely isolated by a ring of police presence.ĢżI wanted to try and capture that sense of it being both utterly magnificent, yetĢżborne of something entirely tragic. Now the Jungle's been demolished, the discussion about the migrant crisis seems to have died down, but the migrant populationĢżis still there in France, and conditions are worse than ever. It's really important than we keep talking about the problem and developing solutions (seeĢż for new updates and volunteering opportunities). I was so honoured to be placed in the competition, and I can't wait to read the other poems!Ģżā
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- Joint second: Olivia Pang (ĀŅĀ׊ć Medicine)
Kenneth
You will never know me but I
I saw you.
I listened into the void for your breath
and your heart, and for a second I heard a
Soft hello.
Fear grips all at once, a sickened swoop until I-
I understand.
Itās just me.
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Beating alone into your silence.
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Clear eyes, lakes of crystal blue,
Skin a wan yellow of grief,
A still object robed in
resounding echoes of a future anguish.
I serenade you with
the sound of my heart beating
āFutile. Futile. Futileā.
Ģż
What fates should have led me to you, kind teacher,
that you should tell,
Not of poetry and mourning,
Nor cherished memories, unspoken regret,
Nor dark storms and anguished cries,
Nor stories of great journeys and glorious rebirth,
But a still manās stark truth in white sheets-
I close your eyesā¦
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Death, stripped of ceremony,
Is an anonymous room in grey morning light
Where two strangers meet
and one leaves.ĢżĢż
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On being awarded second place, Olivia writes: āIn many ways, I have experienced clinical medicine as a series of losses: loss of fear, loss of naivety, and loss of self-doubt. But also erosion of empathy, erosion of idealism, and erosion of identity. I am truly grateful for this opportunity to express a moment that moved me, that I didnāt want to lose to hard-heartedness. It was also a joy to be able to reconnect with the part of myself that loved to write. Thank you.ā
- Highly commended: Muhammad Yusoff (ĀŅĀ׊ć Medicine)
fall and an insomniacās tanka*
Ģż
browning leaves, laden
with tears; wearily waiting
for autumn mercy
dreaming of falling snow, whilstI lie here, dreaming of dreams
*A tanka is a form of Japanese poetry, with a 5-7-5-7-7 syllabic pattern.
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