This year’s High Holiday Poetry Contest–sponsored by MJL and Shemspeed–was a bit of a whopper, as my Australian family would say. The Jewish New Year coming so close to summer vacation might have surprised us, but not you. We demanded that you all produce works of sheer genius in just two weeks. And you came through.
We’ll be running the contest winners all day — so keep coming back throughout the day for more awesome poems. And keep visiting MJL for more great Rosh Hashanah content (like these cool videos) throughout the New Year and beyond.
Our third-place entry comes from Eliyahu Enriquez, who’s no stranger to MJL. (Just a note: All entries were read blind, and we have no idea who the first two winners are!) His poem “Dragon Tefillin” mystified most of us, but also inspired some pretty strong feelings. As one MJL employee wrote: “I don’t really know poetry, and I have no idea what it’s about, but I think it’s amazing.”
Dragon Tefillin
This is what it feels like to drown:
Festivities end.
The angels were never there
To begin with
Your incomplete
Silencer.
So. You return from whence you came.
Skinnydip through unchartered names.
An island Eden, draped in seaweed
That feel like serpents tickling your toes.
Convince yourself
Of Eternity
Embedded in a Cainine stroke
After desperate stroke.
Imbued with perplexity
Dim-witted
And gasping for breathalyzer
You realize
Serendipity
Reincarnated into a pair of anonymous
Dolphins.
Rosh Hashanah
Pronounced: roshe hah-SHAH-nah, also roshe ha-shah-NAH, Origin: Hebrew, the Jewish new year.
