Synkroniciti is excited to announce the winner of our “Recovery” poetry contest. We had so many thought-provoking, beautiful and authentic poems submitted, several by former winners returning with strong pieces exploring new territory. We selected ten finalists, but every poet in this issue is a winner–exceptional quality throughout. Finalists are:
Light and Revelation, Rachael Ikins
April, in the after, Stacie Eirich
The Miscarriage of Demeter’s Rule, Naomi Ruth Lowinsky
Song for Winter Solstice, Angela Waldie
Essay on Living, John Milkereit
Appropriate, Jennifer Maloney
Gypsum and the Gypsy, Ken Farrell
Prose Poem: The Box, Hilary Plattner
One That Got Away, Sara McAulay
Even Though, Abigail Michelini
The winner is Canadian poet Angela Waldie with “Song for Winter Solstice,” subtitled “Poecile atricapillus (Black-capped Chickadee) .” This is very elegant and spare poem, somewhat unassuming amongst a group much of longer pieces, but it has an unexpected emotional punch and a depth of understanding of the cyclical nature of recovery that lies coiled beneath the surface. In telling the story of chickadee song on the morning of the Winter Solstice, Angela touches on difficult seasons and the meaning and purpose of song and story in the face of such seasons. This song anticipates not only the dawn, but the coming spring, a season of new growth. Angela becomes subtly one with the bird, singing the song for Mother Earth and for her own mother, for whom the poem was written.
I’ll have more details about this stunning poem in Angela’s Artist Feature, but it will take us a while to get to the end of the alphabet. “Recovery” comes out tomorrow afternoon, and you can order it now at https://synkroniciti.com/the-magazine/purchase-individual-issues/. The issue contains two more of Angela’s poems and they are all lovely and astonishing in different ways.
Angela Waldie is a writer, editor, and university instructor, living in Treaty 7 Territory, in Calgary. As she grew up in Creston, BC, her poetry often crosses and recrosses the Continental Divide. Her first poetry collection, A Single Syllable of Wild, will be published by Frontenac House in October 2025. Her poetry has also appeared in Prairie Fire, Grain, Event, Feral, Freefall, Willows Wept Review, The Goose, The Antigonish Review and various anthologies.
Congratulations, Angela!