I Shamed the Valleys That Wanted To Eat Me

I don’t want to wait till the moment of my dying
to realize what I have ignored all my life.
I want you to climb me. Climb me because I want you
to know the wounds on my body are not mere conjectures.
I don’t want to drink to my imagination before
understanding the dialects of living.
I don’t want to be stationed at the interpretative bridge to
realize that I have for a long time shot my shadow in the head.
I want the animals I feed awake, let …

Despy Boutris, against a white sheet as background, looks into the camera with head slightly turned to her left with a small smile.

Cityscape With Dysthymia

Despy Boutris Wins a 2023 Zócalo Poetry Prize Honorable Mention Award

Every year, we award the annual Zócalo Poetry Prize to the poem that best evokes a connection to place. Zócalo is pleased to recognize …

Black and white close up of Andrew Calis facing the camera with a grin.

Trying to Explain What Knafeh Is

Andrew Calis Wins a 2023 Zócalo Poetry Prize Honorable Mention Award

Every year, we award the annual Zócalo Poetry Prize to the poem that best evokes a connection to place. Zócalo is pleased to recognize …

We were born

Eleanor Stanford Wins a 2023 Zócalo Poetry Prize Honorable Mention Award

Every year, we award the annual Zócalo Poetry Prize to the poem that best evokes a connection to place. Zócalo is pleased to recognize …

As the Fog Starts Burning Away

Brent Ameneyro Wins a 2023 Zócalo Poetry Prize Honorable Mention Award

Every year, we award the annual Zócalo Poetry Prize to the poem that best evokes a connection to place. Zócalo is pleased to recognize …

Paige Buffington Wins the 2023 Zócalo Poetry Prize

Home Is the Navajo Nation in ‘From 20 Miles Outside of Gallup, Holbrook, Winslow, Farmington, or Albuquerque’—A Place That Pushes and Pulls Its People

Paige Buffington is the winner of the 12th annual Zócalo Public Square Poetry Prize for “From 20 Miles Outside of Gallup, Holbrook, Winslow, Farmington, or Albuquerque.” Her prose poem evokes …