- [Michelle McAdoo] Welcome to Poetry Out Loud And now, our host, the Executive Director of the Mississippi Arts Commission, Sarah Story.

- On behalf of the Mississippi Arts Commission and our partners, The National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation, I welcome you to the 17th annual Mississippi Poetry Out Loud Recitation Contest.

This year, more than 200,000 students and more than 2,000 schools participated in Poetry Out Loud, the poetry education program that is offered free of charge to high school students and teachers across our nation.

The highlight of the program is the national recitation contest in which 55 contestants, one from each of the 50 states, Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and the District of Columbia recite for up to $20,000 in prize money.

Eighteen high schools from across our state, from Clinton to Meridian, Iuka to Pascagoula, began the journey towards today'’s contest when they registered to participate in the Mississippi Poetry Out Loud program at the beginning of the academic year.

In some schools, it began in the English classroom, in some the Theatre classroom, and in others with an interested teacher, librarian, or club adviser leading to an in-school Poetry Out Loud contest held before the winter holidays.

Despite COVID restrictions, distance learning, and alternate school schedules, more than 1,000 students and 59 teachers participated in Mississippi'’s Poetry Out Loud this year.

In February, the school champions represented their schools in a state-wide preliminary contest and the 8 top-scoring contestants will be reciting today, each looking toward the $20,000 first prize at the national recitation contest.

I congratulate all the contestants on their achievement in reaching this stage of the contest, and share my personal best wishes for their success today.

It is now my privilege to introduce the MC for this contest.

As a young child, our MC remembers pretending to be a radio personality at WJSU where her father was General Manager.

It'’s no surprise, therefore, that Michelle McAdoo has worked in radio for over 20 years, and is a producer and host with Mississippi Public Broadcasting Think Radio.

She holds a Master'’s Degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling, and looks forward to starting her own teen talk show and mentoring program.

Please welcome Mississippi Public Broadcasting'’s own Michelle McAdoo.

- Thank you, Sarah, and welcome!

First let me tell you how proud Mississippi Public Broadcasting is to share Poetry Out Loud with our statewide television audience.

We believe that academic contests should and do stand on the same stage as all other pursuits of excellence, and that the contestants deserve not only our attention, but our respect.

Poetry Out Loud seeks to promote the art of poetry in both the classroom and the community.

The program provides an entry point for many students to learn to love poetry and, for most, to introduce them to poems that will stay with them for a lifetime.

Here, with some thoughts about the magic of poetry when heard aloud, is the Poet Laureate of Mississippi, Catherine Pierce.

- Poets famously are big fans of metaphors and similes.

And here's a favorite simile of mine.

A poem is like a snow globe.

Why?

Well, for a few reasons.

Like a snow globe, a poem can hold an entire world within a small space.

Also, like a snow globe, a poem is meticulously crafted.

If all of the intricate pieces don't fit together perfectly, the whole thing will fall apart.

And, significantly, both snow globes and poems are most magical when they're brought to life by someone.

Just as a snow globe is most fully itself when it's picked up and shaken, so is a poem at its most powerful when someone speaks it aloud.

Poetry as a spoken art has existed almost as long as humans have predating, not only written poems, but written anything.

People have always been attuned to the music of language.

Even on the page or the screen, poems rely on sound.

When we hear a poem spoken aloud, we are invited to connect with it in a rich and dynamic way.

We experience more viscerally the pleasures of rhythm and pacing, have a chance to linger over the poem's nuances, absorb its imagery.

We are able, for a little while, to exist inside the carefully constructed globe of the poem.

Through their recitations, this year's Poetry Out Loud contestants will honor the craft and urgency of the poems they've selected.

And through their recitations, we, the listeners, will be able to enter more fully, more openly into the scenes and emotional landscapes of these poems.

Just as the contestants will always carry these poems with them, ready to call them up in moments of joy or sorrow or uncertainty, so will we carry with us the contestants'’ voices, their emphases and their expressively, nuanced renderings.

I thank the contestants for their skill and care with each complex world that they will so thoughtfully hold, consider, and bring to life for us.

I'll close by sharing one of my own poems.

This is "“Enough"” from Danger Days.

Enough.

I got here through no talent of my own.

I did not birth myself or even will myself into being.

One day I was a cluster of cells.

One day I was a heart.

One day I was a human in the world.

Now what?

Look at the luck I was given.

Born into a place with a hot yellow sun.

Born with two nimble hands.

A strong enough voice.

If I'm not shouting down cruelty, or at least singing all the time, what am I doing?

If I'm not building a table or holding a child or slicing tomatoes warm from the garden I've weeded myself, what am I doing?

I bought these electric blue flats, suede.

I did it because it made me feel a little happy.

That small dopamine hit that comes from picturing yourself looking like someone someone wants to look at.

But how absurd is that?

How flimsy?

I've never learned to change a tire.

My music theory is abysmal.

Sometimes I don't realize it's snowing until there's already a dusting on the driveway, which is certainly close to excuseless.

But I swear I'm mainly paying attention.

I swear I'm grateful at least a dozen times a day.

If I could cradle the earth in my hands for 10 seconds, I would, just to show it how tenderly I could hold it.

How I wouldn't drop it.

How I cherish it, even as I'm turning in early instead of going out to see the Perseids.

I've always loved a carnival.

Is it enough to love a carnival?

I could ride the teacups all day.

That shriek that comes from spinning, the one that unfurls from somewhere deep below the throat like a bright streamer, it's language.

It translates into "“Thank you"”.

- Catherine Pierce is the author of four books of poems: Danger Days, A Tornado Is the World, The Girls of Peculiar, and Famous Last Words.

Each of her most recent three books won the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Poetry Prize.

Her work has appeared in The Best American Poetry, the Pushcart Prize anthology, the New York Times, American Poetry Review, and elsewhere.

The recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Mississippi Arts Council, Pierce teaches at Mississippi State University.

Scoring recitations is one of the most important - and most difficult - aspects of a Poetry Out Loud contest.

Judges are asked to evaluate very different recitations, each displaying an impressive level of excellence, and they must decide how well students represent complex poems that may lend themselves to more than one interpretation.

The integrity of Poetry Out Loud rests on the work of the judges at each and every level of the contest.

Serving on today's panel of judges are writer, editor, and instructor of English at Jackson State University, C. Liegh McInnis.

Author, songwriter, singer, Mississippi Arts Commission Roster Artist and Teaching Artist, and Mississippi Humanities Council speaker, Richelle Putnam.

Four-time Poetry Out Loud state finalist, two-time state champion, 2016 national fourth place contestant and University of Mississippi graduate, Lawson David Marchetti.

Creative, scholar, and professor of English at Jackson State University, Dr. Helen J. Crump.

Poet, writer and Mississippi Arts Commission Roster Artist, Dr. Benjamin Morris.

Poetry Out Loud recitations are scored in five categories: The contestants are also scored for accuracy.

They need to recite all the words of the poem, and recite them in the correct order.

It is interesting to note that Poetry Out Loud is a contest, not a competition.

If it were a competition, the contestants would all be reciting the same poems and the judges would be choosing one recitation over another.

In Poetry Out Loud, the judges evaluate each recitation independently according to the five scoring categories.

In other words, the judges do not select the finalists, the scores do.

There will be three rounds in today's contest.

Each contestant has prepared three poems and will recite one in each of the first two rounds.

Their cumulative scores will determine which three contestants go on to recite in the third round, from which our State Champion will be named.

Our State Champion will represent Mississippi in the National Recitation Contest Semifinals on the first of May and, hopefully, the Finals on June fifth.

And now we begin Round One of the 2022 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud Recitation Contest.

Our first contestant is Sarah Rhodes, a sophomore at Clinton High School.

- "“The Glories of Our Blood and State"” by James Shirley.

The glories of our blood and state Are shadows, not substantial things; There is no armour against Fate; Death lays his icy hand on kings: Sceptre and Crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made With the poor crooked scythe and spade.

Some men with swords may reap the field, And plant fresh laurels where they kill: But their strong nerves at last must yield; They tame but one another still: Early or late They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath While they, pale captives, creep to death.

The garlands wither on your brow; Then boast no more your mighty deeds!

Upon Death's purple altar now See where the victor- victim bleeds.

Your heads must come To the cold tomb: Only the actions of the just Smell sweet and blossom in their dust.

- The next contestant is Charles Wesley Nordan, a sophomore at Northwest Rankin High School.

- "“Camouflaging the Chimera"” by Yusef Komunyakaa.

We tied branches to our helmets.

We painted our faces & rifles with mud from a riverbank.

Blades of grass hung from the pockets of our tiger suits.

We wove ourselves into the terrain, content to be a hummingbird'’s target.

We hugged bamboo & leaned against a breeze off the river, slow-dragging with ghosts from Saigon to Bangkok, with women left in doorways reaching in from America.

We aimed at dark-hearted songbirds.

In our way station of shadows rock apes tried to blow our cover, throwing stones at the sunset.

Chameleons crawled our spines, changing from day to night: green to gold, gold to black.

But we waited till the moon touched metal, till something almost broke inside us.

VC struggled with the hillside, like black silk wrestling iron through grass.

We weren'’t there.

The river ran through our bones.

Small animals took refuge against our bodies; we held our breath, ready to spring the L-shaped ambush, as a world revolved under each man'’s eyelid.

- Next is Jennifer Herrin, a junior at Sumrall High School.

- "“And If I Did, What Then?

"” by George Gascoigne.

"“And if I did, what then?

Are you aggriev'’d therefore?

The sea hath fish for every man, And what would you have more?

"” Thus did my mistress once, Amaze my mind with doubt; And popp'’d a question for the nonce To beat my brains about.

Whereto I thus replied: "“Each fisherman can wish That all the seas at every tide Were his alone to fish.

"“And so did I (in vain) But since it may not be, Let such fish there as find the gain, And leave the loss for me.

"“And with such luck and loss I will content myself, Till tides of turning time may toss Such fishers on the shelf.

"“And when they stick on sands, That every man may see, Then will I laugh and clap my hands, As they do now at me.

"” - Next we have Alexa Goodman, a freshman at Oxford High School.

- "“Suppose"” by Phoebe Cary.

Suppose, my little lady, Your doll should break her head, Could you make it whole by crying Till your eyes and nose are red?

And wouldn'’t it be pleasanter To treat it as a joke; And say you '’re glad "“'’T'’was Dolly'’s And not your head that broke?

"” Suppose you'’re dressed for walking, And the rain comes pouring down, Will it clear off any sooner Because you scold and frown?

And wouldn'’t it be nicer For you to smile than pout, And so make sunshine in the house When there is none without?

Suppose your task, my little man, Is very hard to get, Will it make it any easier For you to sit and fret?

And wouldn'’t it be wiser Than waiting like a dunce, To go to work in earnest And learn the thing at once?

Suppose that some boys have a horse, And some a coach and pair, Will it tire you less while walking To say, "“It isn'’t fair?

"” And wouldn'’t it be nobler To keep your temper sweet, And in your heart be thankful You can walk upon your feet?

And suppose the world don'’t please you, Nor the way some people do, Do you think the whole creation Will be altered just for you?

And isn'’t it, my boy or girl, The wisest, bravest plan, Whatever comes, or doesn'’t come, To do the best you can?

- Up next is Noble Wilkinson, a freshman at the Jackson Preparatory School.

- "“In the Desert"” by Stephen Crane.

In the desert I saw a creature, naked, bestial, Who, squatting upon the ground, Held his heart in his hands, And ate of it.

I said, "“Is it good, friend?

"” "“It is bitter -—bitter,"” he answered; "“But I like it Because it is bitter, "“And because it is my heart.

"” - Next, we have Madeline D'Aquin, a sophomore at Biloxi High School.

- "“I Am Offering this Poem"” by Jimmy Santiago Baca.

I am offering this poem to you, since I have nothing else to give.

Keep it like a warm coat when winter comes to cover you, or like a pair of thick socks the cold cannot bite through, I love you.

I have nothing else to give you, so it is a pot full of yellow corn to warm your belly in winter.

It is a scarf for your head, to wear over your hair, to tie up around your face.

I love you.

Keep it, treasure this as you would if you were lost, needing direction, in the wilderness life becomes when mature; and in the corner of your drawer, tucked away like a cabin or hogan in dense trees, come knocking, and I will answer, give you directions, and let you warm yourself by this fire, rest by this fire, and make you feel safe.

I love you.

It'’s all I have to give, and all anyone needs to live, and to go on living inside, when the world outside no longer cares if you live or die; remember, I love you.

- Next, we have Matthew Butler, a sophomore at Tupelo High School.

- "“April Midnight"” by Arthur Symons Side by side through the streets at midnight, Roaming together, Through the tumultuous night of London, In the miraculous April weather.

Roaming together under the gaslight, Day'’s work over, How the Spring calls to us, here in the city, Calls to the heart from the heart of a lover!

Cool the wind blows, fresh in our faces, Cleansing, entrancing, After the heat and the fumes and the footlights, Where you dance and I watch your dancing.

Good it is to be here together, Good to be roaming, Even in London, even at midnight, Lover-like in a lover'’s gloaming.

You the dancer and I the dreamer, Children together, Wandering lost in the night of London, In the miraculous April weather.

- And last is Brentaja Bardwell, a senior at Pascagoula High School.

- "“Famous"” by Naomi Shihab Nye.

The river is famous to the fish.

The loud voice is famous to silence, which knew it would inherit the earth before anybody said so.

The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds watching him from the birdhouse.

The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek.

The idea you carry close to your bosom is famous to your bosom.

The boot is famous to the earth, more famous than the dress shoe, which is famous only to floors.

The bent photograph is famous to the one who carries it and not at all famous to the one who is pictured.

I want to be famous to shuffling men who smile while crossing streets, sticky children in grocery lines, famous as the one who smiled back.

I want to be famous in the way a pulley is famous, or a buttonhole, not because it did anything spectacular, but because it never forgot what it could do.

- This concludes Round One of the 2022 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud Recitation Contest.

We'll now proceed directly to Round Two, during which we'll hear a second recitation from each contestant.

The first recitation in Round Two is by Sarah Rhodes.

An artist and athlete, Sarah is active in her school's theatre group, choir, and thespians, and is a member of the swim team.

She enjoys playing the guitar and plans to attend Brigham Young University.

- "“Emily Dickinson at the Poetry Slam"” by Dan Vera.

I will tell you why she rarely ventured from her house.

It happened like this: One day she took the train to Boston, made her way to the darkened room, put her name down in cursive script and waited her turn.

When they read her name aloud she made her way to the stage straightened the papers in her hands -— pages and envelopes, the backs of grocery bills, she closed her eyes for a minute, took a breath, and began.

From her mouth perfect words exploded, intact formulas of light and darkness.

She dared to rhyme with words like cochineal and described the skies like diadem.

Obscurely worded incantations filled the room with an alchemy that made the very molecules quake.

The solitary words she handled in her upstairs room with keen precision came rumbling out to make the electric lights flicker.

40 members of the audience were treated for hypertension.

20 year old dark haired beauties found their heads had turned a Moses White.

Her second poem erased the memory of every cellphone in the nightclub, and by the fourth line of the sixth verse the grandmother in the upstairs apartment had been cured of her rheumatism.

The papers reported the power outages.

The area hospitals taxed their emergency generators and sirens were heard to wail through the night.

Quietly she made her way to the exit, walked to the terminal and rode back to Amherst.

She never left her room again and never read such syllables aloud.

- Next up is Charles Wesley Nordan.

Wesley has earned a junior Black Belt in martial arts and had received a proficiency ribbon in JROTC.

He spends his free time reading, playing video games, walking his dogs, and building models.

- "“April Midnight"” by Arthur Symons Side by side through the streets at midnight, Roaming together, Through the tumultuous night of London, In the miraculous April weather.

Roaming together under the gaslight, Day'’s work over, How the Spring calls to us, here in the city, Calls to the heart from the heart of a lover!

Cool the wind blows, fresh in our faces, Cleansing, entrancing, After the heat and the fumes and the footlights, Where you dance and I watch your dancing.

Good it is to be here together, Good to be roaming, Even in London, even at midnight, Lover-like in a lover'’s gloaming.

You the dancer and I the dreamer, Children together, Wandering lost in the night of London, In the miraculous April weather.

- Jennifer Herrin.

Jennifer is very active in her school's Drama Club and Thespian Troupe and also belongs to the Improv Team.

A member of the National Technical Honor Society, she also enjoys drawing and playing music.

Jennifer plans to study toward a career as a school guidance counselor.

- "“Do Not!

"” by Stevie Smith Do not despair of man, and do not scold him, Who are you that you should so lightly hold him?

Are you not also a man, and in your heart Are there not warlike thoughts and fear and smart?

Are you not also afraid and in fear cruel, Do you not think of yourself as usual, Faint for ambition, desire to be loved, Prick at a virtuous thought by beauty moved?

You love your wife, you hold your children dear, Then say not that Man is vile, but say they are.

But they are not.

So is your judgment shown Presumptuous, false, quite vain, merely your own Sadness for failed ambition set outside, Made a philosophy of, prinked, beautified In noble dress and into the world sent out To run with the ill it most pretends to rout.

Oh know your own heart, that heart'’s not wholly evil, And from the particular judge the general, If judge you must, but with compassion see life, Or else, of yourself despairing, flee strife.

- Alexa Goodman.

A swimmer, a golfer, Alexa has won several academic awards and enjoys reading and watching movies.

She hopes to attend a major university and to study toward a career in radiology.

- "“Truth is I would like to escape myself"” by Nour Al Ghraowi.

Truth is I would like to escape myself.

Detach my body from my skin, peel it layer by layer to uncover beneath the surface of petals and thorns piled up year after year, who I am and who I want to be.

I want to be the flower that grows in dirt, the feather that flies free between the cracks of fences.

A wise woman once told me, don'’t worry about you, worry about who you could be.

I want to be the woman who sits on a desk and writes pieces of oceans, rivers on a white space in a place where imagination has no border.

- Noble Wilkinson.

A scholar, athlete, and politician, Noble is president of his school's Gaming Club, participates in track and student council and has received a Silver Medal for the National Latin Exam.

He hopes to attend MSU to study toward a career in anesthesiology.

- "“In Love, His Grammar Grew"” by Stephen Dunn.

In love, his grammar grew rich with intensifiers, and adverbs fell madly from the sky like pheasants for the peasantry, and he, as sated as they were, lolled under shade trees until roused by moonlight and the beautiful fraternal twins and and but.

Oh that was when he knew he couldn'’t resist a conjunction of any kind.

One said accumulate, the other was a doubter who loved the wind and the mind that cleans up after it.

For love he wanted to break all the rules, light a candle behind a sentence named Sheila, always running on and wishing to be stopped by the hard button of a period.

Sometimes, in desperation, he'’d look toward a mannequin or a window dresser with a penchant for parsing.

But mostly he wanted you, Sheila, and the adjectives that could precede and change you: bluesy, fly-by-night, queen of all that is and might be.

- Madeline D'Aquin.

When not participating in track, cross-country, volleyball, powerlifting and Beta Club, Madeline finds time for drawing, painting and pottery!

On her school's Honor Roll, she earned perfect scores in biology and algebra on the Mississippi Academic Assessment Program tests.

Madeline is planning to be an architect.

- "“Ways of Talking"” by Ha Jin.

We used to like talking about grief Our journals and letters were packed with losses, complaints, and sorrows.

Even if there was no grief we wouldn'’t stop lamenting as though longing for the charm of a distressed face.

Then we couldn'’t help expressing grief So many things descended without warning: labor wasted, loves lost, houses gone, marriages broken, friends estranged, ambitions worn away by immediate needs.

Words lined up in our throats for a good whining.

Grief seemed like an endless river-— the only immortal flow of life.

After losing a land and then giving up a tongue, we stopped talking of grief Smiles began to brighten our faces.

We laugh a lot, at our own mess.

Things become beautiful, even hailstones in the strawberry fields.

- Matthew Butler.

A leader in his school's Poetry Club, Matthew has won awards in theatre competitions and enjoys swimming.

His career goal is also about leadership: He hopes to make a name for himself as an academic administrator.

- "“It Isn'’t Me"” by James Lasdun.

It isn'’t me, he'’d say, stepping out of a landscape that offered, he'’d thought, the backdrop to a plausible existence until he entered it; it'’s just not me, he'’d murmur, walking away.

It'’s not quite me, he'’d explain, apologetic but firm, leaving some job they'’d found him.

They found him others: he'’d go, smiling his smile, putting his best foot forward, till again he'’d find himself reluctantly concluding that this, too, wasn'’t him.

He wanted to get married, make a home, unfold a life among his neighbors'’ lives, branching and blossoming like a tree, but when it came to it, it isn'’t me was all he seemed to learn from all his diligent forays outward.

And why it should be so hard for someone not so different from themselves, to find what they'’d found, barely even seeking; what gift he'’d not been given, what forlorn charm of his they'’d had the luck to lack, puzzled them-—though not unduly: they lived inside their lives so fully they couldn'’t, in the end, believe in him, except as some half-legendary figure destined, or doomed, to carry on his back the weight of their own all-but-weightless, stray doubts and discomforts.

Only sometimes, alone in offices or living rooms, they'’d hear that phrase again: it isn'’t me, and wonder, briefly, what they were, and where, and feel the strangeness of being there.

- Brentaja Bardwell.

Brentaja loves painting and reading and belongs to her school's book club and garden club.

She was named Best Supporting Actress playing the Red Queen in "Wonderland" and will be attending MSU to major in Elementary Education.

- "“The Paradox"” by Paul Laurence Dunbar.

I am the mother of sorrows, I am the ender of grief; I am the bud and the blossom, I am the late-falling leaf.

I am thy priest and thy poet, I am thy serf and thy king; I cure the tears of the heartsick, When I come near they shall sing.

White are my hands as the snowdrop; Swart are my fingers as clay; Dark is my frown as the midnight, Fair is my brow as the day.

Battle and war are my minions, Doing my will as divine; I am the calmer of passions, Peace is a nursling of mine.

Speak to me gently or curse me, Seek me or fly from my sight; I am thy fool in the morning, Thou art my slave in the night.

Down to the grave will I take thee, Out from the noise of the strife; Then shalt thou see me and know me-— Death, then, no longer, but life.

Then shalt thou sing at my coming, Kiss me with passionate breath, Clasp me and smile to have thought me Aught save the foeman of Death.

Come to me, brother, when weary, Come when thy lonely heart swells; I'’ll guide thy footsteps and lead thee Down where the Dream Woman dwells.

- This concludes Round Two.

Congratulations, contestants, for all you've achieved, and a special thank you to your teachers, coaches, and parents: You've all done amazing work!

The scores from the first and second rounds have been tabulated and the three highest-scoring contestants will now each recite a third poem.

The scores they earn in this round will be added to their standing scores that will be used to select Mississippi's representative to the Poetry Out Loud National Recitation Contest Semifinals on May first.

The three finalists will recite in alphabetical order.

To begin the final round of the 2022 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud State Finals Contest, is Madeline D'Can.

- "“The Tyger"” by William Blake.

Tyger Tyger, burning bright, In the forests of the night; What immortal hand or eye, Could frame thy fearful symmetry In what distant deeps or skies.

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand, dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art, Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand?

& what dread feet?

What the hammer?

what the chain, In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil?

what dread grasp, Dare its deadly terrors clasp!

When the stars threw down their spears And water'’d heaven with their tears: Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger Tyger burning bright, In the forests of the night: What immortal hand or eye, Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

- Next is, Sarah Rhodes.

- "“Immortal Sails"” by Alfred Noyes Now, in a breath, we'’ll burst those gates of gold, And ransack heaven before our moment fails.

Now, in a breath, before we, too, grow old, We'’ll mount and sing and spread immortal sails.

It is not time that makes eternity.

Love and an hour may quite out-span the years, And give us more to hear and more to see Than life can wash away with all its tears.

Dear, when we part, at last, that sunset sky Shall not be touched with deeper hues than this; But we shall ride the lightning ere we die And seize our brief infinitude of bliss, With time to spare for all that heaven can tell, While eyes meet eyes, and look their last farewell.

- And, finally, Noble Wilkinson.

- "“If We Must Die"” by Claude McKay.

If we must die, let it not be like hogs Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot, While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs, Making their mock at our accursèd lot.

If we must die, O let us nobly die, So that our precious blood may not be shed In vain; then even the monsters we defy Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!

O kinsmen!

we must meet the common foe!

Though far outnumbered let us show us brave, And for their thousand blows deal one death-blow!

What though before us lies the open grave?

Like men we'’ll face the murderous, cowardly pack, Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!

- And now, the announcement we've all been waiting to hear, the naming of our third and second place finalists, and of our 2022 State Champion.

Presenting this year's awards is Sarah Story, Executive Director of the Mississippi Arts Commission.

- Thank you, Michelle McAdoo.

It is my privilege to present this year's Mississippi Poetry Out Loud State Finals Contest Awards for third place, second place, and state champion.

The 2022 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud Third Place Finalist is Sarah Rhodes.

The 2022 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud Second Place Finalist and recipient of a $100 award and $200 grant for their school library is Madelyn DeCamp.

And the 2022 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud State Champion and recipient of a $200 award and a $500 grant for their school library is Noble Wilkinson.

Congratulations and thanks to everyone who contributed to the success of Poetry Out Loud.

The teachers, students, coaches, parents, clinicians, volunteers, and judges, and the schools and organizations that partnered with the Mississippi Arts Commission to bring the program to the students of our state.

We're grateful for the participation of Mississippi's Poet Laureate Katherine Pierce.

And as always, our longstanding Poetry Out Loud partner, Mississippi Public Broadcasting.

Registration for the 2023 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud program opens on Monday, May 23rd.

Any and all school and homeschool organizations that teach students in grades 9 through 12 are encouraged to visit the Mississippi Arts Commission website at Arts.MS.gov for more information.

This concludes the 2022 Mississippi Poetry Out Loud Recitation Contest.

I look forward to seeing you all in person next year.