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<h5>Kingsley Dominic has won the August edition of the <a href="https://www.wrr.ng/csr/bppc/">BRIGITTE POIRSON POETRY CONTEST</a> (BPPC) 2018 which was themed: <a href="https://www.wrr.ng/news/bppc-august-2018/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">‘</a><em>JOURNEYING’. </em></h5>
<blockquote><p>Dominic beat 89 other entrants to the first prize with his rhymed poem ‘ON A STORMY SHORE’. <a href="https://www.wrr.ng/news/ogedengbe-bppc-july-2018/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Ogedengbe Tolulope Impact</a>, the winner of the July edition, emerged the first-runner-up for his poem ‘I HOPE TO ARRIVE WITH A SMILE’ while ‘THE WANDERER’ by regular finalist, Izuchukwu Saviour Otubelu, came third.</p></blockquote>
<p>Dominic, a graduate of Chemistry from Benue State University (BSU), Makurdi, is a flexible writer succeeding in poetry, prose and drama genres. He was shortlisted for the 2017 Etisalat Flash Fiction prize.</p>
<p>On his philosophy as a writer, he says: “I believe words have the ability to own and control the writer rather than the other way”. He is currently working on a novel titled SEVEN HOURS and has a poetry collection due for publications in 2018.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.wrr.ng/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Kingsley-Dominic-BPPC-AUG-18.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-35553 aligncenter" src="https://www.wrr.ng/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Kingsley-Dominic-BPPC-AUG-18.jpg" alt="" loading="lazy"></a></p>
<h4>Below are the top 10 poems:</h4>
<ol>
<li>ON A STORMY SHORE BY KINGSLEY DOMINIC</li>
<li>I HOPE TO ARRIVE WITH A SMILE BY OGEDENGBE TOLU IMPACT</li>
<li>THE WANDERER BY IZUCHUKWU SAVIOUR OTUBELU</li>
<li>JOURNEYING IN THIS JOURNEY BY OLOLADE AKINLABI</li>
<li>EARS BY THE FIREPLACE BY IDOWU KUNLERE</li>
<li>A TRAVELLER COMES (A SONNET) BY EZINNE ONYEKACHI OHA</li>
<li>KPACHARANYA BY NWACHUKWU PRINCE CHUKWUDINDU</li>
<li>BRITTLE BY OGWIJI EHI-KOWOCHIO BLESSING</li>
<li>PILGRIM’S VOYAGE BY AIRE JOSHUA OMOTAYO</li>
<li>THE HALLWAY OF OUR HOME BY BLESSING OMEIZA OJO</li>
</ol>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>ON A STORMY SHORE BY KINGSLEY DOMINIC</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">The waves tossed at me<br>
Trying to tear me up into debrises,<br>
“What will be will be!”<br>
Was all that came to mind amid the crises.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">How does one go from a Pythagoras<br>
To a caricature of the Life of Pi?<br>
Just that on this turf there’s no tiger to harass<br>
And help a brother go by.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">We paid the little we could garner<br>
To make this trip through the dessert and drought.<br>
Who said prosperity was softly fought?<br>
Now corpses litter the Mediterranean’s corner.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">In our quest for greener pastures,<br>
We have become more manures,<br>
To whet the history books<br>
With the proverbial clue that what you seek in sokoto<br>
Most times lies in your “sokoto”(pocket).</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">In our search for what’s not missing<br>
We discover that Eskimos aren’t really on the northern poles.<br>
That money doesn’t grow on trees anywhere.<br>
That the Mediterranean was closer to death than Spain.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">On this last voyage of mine,<br>
I finally learn the bitter truth<br>
That in search of what’s not lost<br>
We often lose ourselves.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>I HOPE TO ARRIVE WITH A SMILE BY OGEDENGBE</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">I hope to arrive with a smile,<br>
Someday on this journey of life.<br>
I am treading the path of Nile,<br>
Hoping to thrive and end alive.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Someday on this journey of life,<br>
I hope to arrive with a smile<br>
And be welcomed home by my wife<br>
After trudging through the last mile.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">I am treading the path of Nile,<br>
Hoping to thrive and end alive.<br>
I hope to arrive with a smile,<br>
Someday on this journey of life.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">This path I tread is rife with strife,<br>
Hostile strife snaring lives with wile.<br>
Someday on this journey of life,<br>
I hope to arrive with a smile.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>THE WANDERER BY IZUCHUKWU SAVIOUR OTUBELU</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">I am a newborn child gasping for breath,<br>
Sailing on a ship without a captain<br>
I am a fire roaring in the open hearth<br>
Like a brother in search of his long lost twin</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">I can’t see the sunrise- my eyes are bleary<br>
My fate was shaped before the day of my birth<br>
Shall I fall forty times before I complete this journey?<br>
I am a newborn child gasping for breath</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Mother believes Pharmacy suits me just fine<br>
But Father says I’ll work wonders in Engineering<br>
Thus I am left hanging- a broken twine<br>
Sailing on a ship without a captain</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">I’m in love with Fine Arts but everyone thinks I’m insane<br>
Pray, how many more hills will I climb before my death<br>
On this remote island deserted in the rain?<br>
I am a fire roaring in the open hearth</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">I am like the eagle that was made for the air<br>
But instead dwells underwater, soaked to the skin<br>
Alone on a long and winding road that leads nowhere<br>
Like a brother in search of his long lost twin</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">I am a newborn child gasping for breath,<br>
Sailing on a ship without a captain<br>
I am a fire roaring in the open hearth<br>
Like a brother in search of his long lost twin</p>
<p><strong>JOURNEYING IN THIS JOURNEY BY OLOLADE AKINLABI</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">i<br>
This journey starts from the sea-men,<br>
Coalition of sea-men to meet the ova;<br>
Crumple and trample in the genital’s den<br>
And at the blink of an eye, it is over.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">ii<br>
This journey continues in the womb;<br>
A solitude dungeon like a tomb-<br>
Feeding from the filthy filter of umbilical<br>
The world then is not like this, not identical.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">iii<br>
We then cross the tarmac of non-existence<br>
To the wildly wide world called life<br>
Where all eyes wear the mask of tense<br>
And we crawl, walk and join the strive.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">iv<br>
In this journey are days of tasty meal<br>
And the horrible days without a meal.<br>
They are the nights we count the stars-<br>
Sing songs of hope, and grope our scars.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">v<br>
This journey includes a good mourning<br>
On a day we laugh out loud our cries<br>
And make amusement from our mourning;<br>
Death is not a choice, thus, we make more tries.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">vi<br>
Journeying in this journey includes me, you and us<br>
And we all ride on the spine of time as if on a horse.<br>
This journey includes a day we shall leave<br>
And other sea-men will be birthed to live</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>EARS BY THE FIREPLACE BY IDOWU KUNLERE</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Tears by the fireplace, anguish in the clay pot<br>
Puffs of old ash weep like fizzing oil, for the young tree fell this day<br>
by the rustler’s ruthless axe,</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Tears by the fireplace, sadness, like cloves of fire, sears mortal tongues,<br>
sorrow sours innocent tongues<br>
The young tree which once sat,<br>
By the mouth of the biggest water court in the heart of the thickest forest,</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">quietly, minding its own business,<br>
It had dreamt of the day it would blossom into a big canopy that would give<br>
warmth to all<br>
All, including the games and their rustlers, for its kindness knew no colour<br>
or bloodline,</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">But here it is today, cut down before its prime<br>
its bloody sap splattered across the forest, its dreams quenched by dews of hatred,<br>
its kindness, now a relic of a violent past,<br>
The rustler’s strife that ended its lofty dreams respects no boundaries,</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Now awaiting it in the rustler’s indifferent red flame<br>
is the same fate that befell its great ancestors, at the same fireplace,<br>
to burn to a second death as the rustler cooks his stolen spoils<br>
Double humiliation!<br>
Tears by the fireplace, anguish in the clay pot</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>A TRAVELLER COMES (A SONNET) BY EZINNE ONYEKACHI OHA</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Wait not on kind winds to bake crumbs of cake,<br>
For stardom gulps cups, be it booze or tea<br>
A traveller comes; the gods are awake<br>
To set thy sails on the sly wings of sea</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Smoke fumes choke the stars; the night bird bends song<br>
To form storms of death on thy narrow way<br>
The tears of the sky drowns thy truthful tongue<br>
And clouds cough stones, thy journey’s bliss to sway</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Days fade to nights and moons moan like aged arms;<br>
Suns freeze fresh, flowing streams to blocks of ice<br>
Time breathes slow like dead woods of festered farms,<br>
But thou shall learn the swiftest sword to slice</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Fear not the ghoulish barks of ghostly roam</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>KPACHARANYA BY NWACHUKWU PRINCE CHUKWUDINDU</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Lend me not only your ear<br>
But let your soul be here<br>
Fix your eyes steadily at me<br>
As I bring you the pictures to see<br>
That you might be smarter than a serpent</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">The earth is like the Tower of Babel<br>
Filled with different tongues and labels<br>
There are the few on locomotion<br>
And there are crowd on commotion<br>
Toughning potential dreams like cement</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">O you zealous and fervent lad<br>
That has left your armour unclad<br>
Kpacharanya! Lest you unhold your grip<br>
Lest by ignorance you slip off the tip<br>
Consider the sacrifices you’ve spent</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Keep straight the way you traverse on<br>
Envisaging the crown at the setting sun<br>
When your heart ponders on backward thought<br>
Remember the cause of the pillar of salt<br>
Of which aftermath is endless torment</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Beware of thorns in flowery coverage<br>
Rocks adorned in foamy camouflage<br>
Ignore the howling and lions’ roar<br>
keep hold on your vision to soar<br>
Looking out for calling voices at every moment</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;"><em>Note: ‘Kpacharanya’ is an Igbo word for ‘Be careful’</em></p>
<p><strong>BRITTLE BY OGWIJI EHI-KOWOCHIO BLESSING</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">my father’s voice is a dark hole;<br>
when i was six, I fell into it,<br>
tasted his liquid darkness<br>
and i became a light-<br>
too bright for the prying<br>
eyes of dawn.<br>
in my sojourn, i have climbed<br>
seven mountains of tears<br>
and crossed ten rivers of pain;<br>
but for the map on mama’s palm<br>
i would have been long lost<br>
in this forest of uncertainties.<br>
So each night when my mother clasps<br>
her palms to allow the meandering paths<br>
rub against one another,<br>
she is telling an angel<br>
to carve out another conduit for me,<br>
one that leads to many places.<br>
mine is a brittle story,<br>
and on days like this,<br>
it breaks into pieces<br>
and scatters around<br>
like the lines in this poem-<br>
some white, some black<br>
but all coated with molten gratitude.</p>
<p><strong>PILGRIM’S VOYAGE BY AIRE JOSHUA OMOTAYO</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">The sun has drowned into a rippled river<br>
Father, dusk is a here with a grail of sunset<br>
And its feet are stained with sands of the Sahara<br>
Where pilgrims found a mirage to cast their net</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Mother, the nights are filled with bitter birds<br>
Whetting their beaks on my rusty roof<br>
Through my dreams, their chirps carry broken words<br>
Woven around my window like a silky woof</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">The tales of harmattan stained my lips<br>
My feet mastered the dance of sonorous tunes<br>
Like an acrobatic parade, they went into a frenzy of flips<br>
As the mouth of the wind gaped into mysterious runes</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">Father, heave your sighs in the pocket of your face<br>
For my arms are crossed to the salutes of Wakanda<br>
Mother, pour your tears into an empty vase<br>
For the bouquet is weeping at the wilting flower</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">The walls of my room is a graffiti of haunted photograph<br>
Hanging on my shelf with dusty vignette<br>
In reminiscence, carve me an epitaph<br>
For my bed is tomb, there lies my silhouette</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">There are no rooms left in these lands<br>
No elegies for my tired lips<br>
For home is not a place made with hands<br>
But a place where the sun and moon shine without eclipse</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>THE HALLWAY OF OUR HOME BY BLESSING OMEIZA OJO</strong></p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">So when asked why I listen<br>
to tales about strange lands,<br>
I answered “we all travel to places<br>
of our choice, but we’ll soon journey<br>
beyond dreams, perhaps I could know<br>
of the reformed norms and cultures<br>
before I journey the path of mortality.”</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">They asked why I don’t<br>
play haunting dirges for those gone.<br>
I replied, “I was a child when I wished<br>
my demi-gods pleasant journey with dirges<br>
and they never come back.<br>
Now I am a man, I’d rather say goodnight<br>
for there’s hope to see the sun smile<br>
at dawn.”</p>
<p style="padding-left: 30px;">And again they asked<br>
“why I don’t bid au revoir.”<br>
I said in reply, “it’s a subtle way<br>
of sending a soul home untimely.”<br>
They smiled and said<br>
“we are sojourners,<br>
dust is our actual home,<br>
we’ll return someday<br>
and hole is the hallway not greetings.</p>
<p>A cash prize of N8000 will be awarded to Dominic. Also, all the TOP 10 finalists will be automatically entered for the <a href="https://www.wrr.ng/csr/albert-jungers-poetry-prize-ajpp/">ALBERT JUNGERS POETRY PRIZE</a> (AJPP) 2018 and published in the BPPC 2018 anthology. The finalists will also each receive a certificate and a copy of the BPPC 2018 anthology, to be awarded at the Words Rhymes &; Rhythm Literary Festival 2018.</p>
<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;">The<a href="https://wrr.ng/csr/bppc/"> BRIGITTE POIRSON POETRY CONTEST</a>, a brainchild of Words Rhymes &; Rhythm (WRR), is a monthly writing contest aimed at rewarding the under-appreciated talent of young Nigerian poets. It was instituted in February 2015 in honor of Brigitte Poirson, a French poet and lecturer, editor, who has over the years worked assiduously to promote and support African poetry. Now in its third season as one of the few credible contests for poets, the BPPC has since grown to be one of country’s most popular, especially among the younger poets.</h5>
<blockquote><p><a href="https://www.wrr.ng/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BPPC-LOGO1.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-34519 aligncenter" src="https://www.wrr.ng/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BPPC-LOGO1.jpg" alt="" loading="lazy"></a></p></blockquote>
<h4 style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.wrr.ng/news/bppc-september-2018/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>Click here to Enter for BPPC September 2018</strong></a></h4>
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BRIGITTE POIRSON POETRY CONTEST: KINGSLEY DOMINIC IS BPPC AUGUST 2018 WINNER
