Whiting Award Winners
Since 1985, the Foundation has supported creative writing through the Whiting Awards, which are given annually to ten emerging writers in fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama.
Roy stored his ammunition in a metal box he kept hidden in the closet. As with everything else hidden in the apartment, I knew exactly where to find it. There was a layer of loose .22 rounds on the bottom of the box under shells of bigger caliber, dropped there by the handful the way men drop pennies on their dressers at night. I took some and put them in a hiding place of my own. With these I started loading up the rifle. Hammer cocked, a round in the chamber, finger resting lightly on the trigger, I drew a bead on whoever walked by—women pushing strollers, children, garbage collectors laughing and calling to each other, anyone—and as they passed under my window I sometimes had to bite my lip to keep from laughing in the ecstasy of my power over them, and at their absurd and innocent belief that they were safe.
A grotesquely fat woman lives in the farthest corner of the village. Her name is Matilde. When she walks to market, she must gather up her fat just as another woman gathers up her skirts, daintily pinching it between her fingers and hooking it over her wrists. Matilde’s fat moves about her gracefully, sighing and rustling with her every gesture. She walks as if enveloped by a dense storm cloud, from which the real, sylph-like Matilde is waiting to emerge, blinding as a sunbeam.
The cat was making friends. The previous day when Emmet returned home, he had found four other cats loitering near his building. He worried what would happen if the cats jumped him when he left the house. The cats understood his language, but what passed among their heads was impenetrable to him. He had observed their movements all summer and listened to their sighs and spits and sounds, but he was no closer to infiltrating any part of it as a sign.
DOU YI
My hands were packed in dry ice
Flown across the Pacific and
Stitched onto a man who lost his overseas.
My palms open doors to
Rooms my feet haven't walked through and
Caress a woman my eyes will never see.
It doesn't snow there but my
Nails ache when they touch ice and
Scratch strange characters onto that
Soldier's skin while he's sleeping.
His doctors call it post-traumatic stress but
He knows they're words from a
Language his tongue never learned
Justice.
Justice.
Justice
Across the East Sea a yam farmer
Uses my corneas to see.
She dreams of snow but thinks
It's ashes from a childhood fire bombing.
On the far side of the Atlantic my stomach digests
Food that never passed through my lips
Food my teeth didn't chew
Food my tongue hasn't tasted
Food that could have made this spirit stronger
And act sooner if someone offered it to Dou Yi.
But my heart--
My heart beats in this town,
Pumping blood through a man
Loved by the son of an official,
A son who moved Heaven and Earth for
His Happiness.
His Future.
His New Harmony.
These offerings have given me strength
I feel my spirit reviving!
Justice.
Justice.
Justice.
Justice and burial for the widow Dou Yi
Justice.
Justice.
Justice.
But how can you bury a woman whose butchered body's still living?
Justice.
Justice.
That is my heart. It should beat inside me.
(Dou Yi thrusts her hand into Rocket's chest and retrieves her heart.)
Come the marrow-hours when he couldn’t sleep,
the boy river-brinked and chorded.
Mud-bedded himself here in the root-mesh; bided.
Sieved our alluvial sounds—
PEACHES
If you are one of those people who come to shows just so you can cough your way through them, please take this time to unwrap your cough drops and remind your body to shut itself the fuck up. However, this is still a show that you are allowed to be a part of. If you feel like laughing, laugh. If you wanna shout, bitch, shout, we will gladly hold your mule. Talk to us if you want. This is your church. And for those of you who are quiet, obedient and unresponsive in your church, consider this yo black church, yo sanctuary, yo juke joint, yo kitchen table, yo trial shaker, yo money maker, yo elevator, yo resuscitator.
Roy stored his ammunition in a metal box he kept hidden in the closet. As with everything else hidden in the apartment, I knew exactly where to find it. There was a layer of loose .22 rounds on the bottom of the box under shells of bigger caliber, dropped there by the handful the way men drop pennies on their dressers at night. I took some and put them in a hiding place of my own. With these I started loading up the rifle. Hammer cocked, a round in the chamber, finger resting lightly on the trigger, I drew a bead on whoever walked by—women pushing strollers, children, garbage collectors laughing and calling to each other, anyone—and as they passed under my window I sometimes had to bite my lip to keep from laughing in the ecstasy of my power over them, and at their absurd and innocent belief that they were safe.
A grotesquely fat woman lives in the farthest corner of the village. Her name is Matilde. When she walks to market, she must gather up her fat just as another woman gathers up her skirts, daintily pinching it between her fingers and hooking it over her wrists. Matilde’s fat moves about her gracefully, sighing and rustling with her every gesture. She walks as if enveloped by a dense storm cloud, from which the real, sylph-like Matilde is waiting to emerge, blinding as a sunbeam.
The cat was making friends. The previous day when Emmet returned home, he had found four other cats loitering near his building. He worried what would happen if the cats jumped him when he left the house. The cats understood his language, but what passed among their heads was impenetrable to him. He had observed their movements all summer and listened to their sighs and spits and sounds, but he was no closer to infiltrating any part of it as a sign.
DOU YI
My hands were packed in dry ice
Flown across the Pacific and
Stitched onto a man who lost his overseas.
My palms open doors to
Rooms my feet haven't walked through and
Caress a woman my eyes will never see.
It doesn't snow there but my
Nails ache when they touch ice and
Scratch strange characters onto that
Soldier's skin while he's sleeping.
His doctors call it post-traumatic stress but
He knows they're words from a
Language his tongue never learned
Justice.
Justice.
Justice
Across the East Sea a yam farmer
Uses my corneas to see.
She dreams of snow but thinks
It's ashes from a childhood fire bombing.
On the far side of the Atlantic my stomach digests
Food that never passed through my lips
Food my teeth didn't chew
Food my tongue hasn't tasted
Food that could have made this spirit stronger
And act sooner if someone offered it to Dou Yi.
But my heart--
My heart beats in this town,
Pumping blood through a man
Loved by the son of an official,
A son who moved Heaven and Earth for
His Happiness.
His Future.
His New Harmony.
These offerings have given me strength
I feel my spirit reviving!
Justice.
Justice.
Justice.
Justice and burial for the widow Dou Yi
Justice.
Justice.
Justice.
But how can you bury a woman whose butchered body's still living?
Justice.
Justice.
That is my heart. It should beat inside me.
(Dou Yi thrusts her hand into Rocket's chest and retrieves her heart.)
Come the marrow-hours when he couldn’t sleep,
the boy river-brinked and chorded.
Mud-bedded himself here in the root-mesh; bided.
Sieved our alluvial sounds—
PEACHES
If you are one of those people who come to shows just so you can cough your way through them, please take this time to unwrap your cough drops and remind your body to shut itself the fuck up. However, this is still a show that you are allowed to be a part of. If you feel like laughing, laugh. If you wanna shout, bitch, shout, we will gladly hold your mule. Talk to us if you want. This is your church. And for those of you who are quiet, obedient and unresponsive in your church, consider this yo black church, yo sanctuary, yo juke joint, yo kitchen table, yo trial shaker, yo money maker, yo elevator, yo resuscitator.