Chez Robert Giron

Gival Press is pleased to announce that Chino Mayrina of Davis, California has won the 8th Annual Oscar Wilde Award for his poem entitled We Must Always Sing.

Chino Mayrina received a cash prize of $100.00 and his poem is posted on the Gival Press website (www.givalpress.com).

Winner of the 2009 Gival Press Oscar Wilde Award
We Must Always Sing
by Chino Mayrina of Davis, California.

Honorable Mentions:

The Break Up
by Michael Montlack of New York, New York.

Boneyfiddle: Floodgate
by Amanda Rachelle Warren of Aiken, South Carolina.

My Carpenter
by Jeff Walt of Honolulu, Hawaii.

Everyone Knows
by Trish Cole of St. Mary's City, Maryland.


WINNER OF THE 2009 GIVAL PRESS OSCAR WILDE AWARD


We Must Always Sing

There is a time for everything,
a season for every activity under heaven.
- Ecclesiastes 3:1


***

We heard the water running
before it turned into milk.
Our teeth felt buzzed and sweet
before we were told of honey.

Our open mouths swayed,
having been throbbed into
prehistoric song before learning
about dissonant supplication.

The smell of sizzling meat
washed from our tingling beards
as we drank from the chalice
we poured our love into.

We bathed in clear river when
there was no need for stronger bones.
We tasted the same peaks when
there was no need to stomach them.

***

It is sunset,
the rivers are burning,
but for now
everything is perfect.
In this narrow strip of space
on the brimming Castro Street
condensation means love.

We are marching
to the pulse of our bridge.
18:23 and 20:13
are nothing but times here.
We are naked without having to
huddle through nights lit
by new moons.

If we must burn, may we
smolder like foxfires—
wound healers earth diggers
hopeful children of modernity.

Glittering precariously on the brink,
we blow kisses to the coming night
because we know the earth is moving.
Out of smoke and liquor
neon lights and guns
the air drips
with mouths swaying
condensing
almost like rain.

***

Our bottles and jars will not be empty.
We will be tired, but just like star-loved children
we will sway in moonlit concert, mouths
pulsating to the lilt of rivers unburned.


Copyright © 2009 by Chino Mayrina.


Biography:
Chino Mayrina is currently a fourth-year undergraduate at the University of California, Davis, pursuing a major in English and minors in Spanish and French. He plans to get an MFA in Creative Writing in the future. Meanwhile, he’s hoping to graduate on time and teach in Spain for a year or two as he scrambles to pay off his student loans. This is his first publication and award for writing.

Judge: Stephen S. Mills, last year’s winner, who read the entries anonymously, served as the final judge.
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