Cherry Trees Ought to Be You: “Roses Are Read” Contest Winner

Over the past ten days, 150 people posted their favorite literary quotes on the nature of love to Facebook and Twitter. Thanks so much to everyone who participated in our “Roses Are Read” contest. What breadth of entries: from Emily Bronte to Arthur Conan Doyle; Edna St. Vincent Millay to Dr. Seuss!

For our winning entry, we sought something timeless yet fresh. A succinct phrase that opened up worlds of imagery. Many submitted the words of Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, but one passage stuck out to us as at once simple, sensual, and surprising. Congratulations to our winner, Kelly Chrystal, for posting the final two lines of Neruda’s Poema XIV, “Juegas todos los días” (“Every Day You Play”), from Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair:

Incidentally, nice way of meshing Valentine’s Day with today’s holiday, Washington’s Birthday. You can read Neruda’s whole poem here in Spanish and translated into English.

We hope you enjoy your free issues of Ploughshares, Kelly, and we’re glad to see so many fans of our journal out there. Honorable mentions after the jump!

It ought to make us feel ashamed when we talk like we know what we’re talking about when we talk about love.
–Raymond Carver, “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love”

So soft this morning, ours. Yes. Carry me along, taddy, like you done through the toy fair! If I seen him bearing down on me now under whitespread wings like he’d come from Arkangels, I sink I’d die down over his feet, humbly dumbly, only to washup. Yes, tid. There’s where. First. We pass through grass behush the bush to. Whish! A gull. Gulls. Far calls. Coming, far! End here. Us then. Finn, again! Take. Bussoftlhee, mememormee! Till thousendsthee. Lps. The keys to. Given! A way a lone a last a loved a long the
–James Joyce, Finnegans Wake