We are excited to announce the winner and runner up of the January 2025 Chattanooga Writers’ Guild Monthly Contest is John C. Mannone with the submissions “Traces” and “House Repair.” Our poetry judge, Helga Kidder, also wishes to award an honorable mention to Gwen Mullins with the submission “No Trace of What Used to Be, What Could Have Been.” This month’s submission theme was “Traces.”
Traces
Tucked between the folds
of space and time
and in the dust of Earth once blown
as final breath of stars;
in the way the morning silks the petals
with its dew or how the slender stem drinks
minerals from the ground;
in the way the butterflies balance on a rose
or the Monarchs trade the gold treasured
in their wings for bits of iron crystals;
even more the coral fish, whose vibrant colors
soak the atoms of vanadium in their fins, yet
reflect no vanity, they only glimmer the sea;
in the way your lips glitter in the copper sun
and your hair, as gentle brushed aluminum,
still sweetly scents the wind;
in the way my heart traces
silver-lined echoes of you
tucked between the folds
of space and time,
the answers are there.
House Repair
It stood on cracked foundation; broken
walls. Floors squeaked, ached with every step.
Mold had long-since infiltrated the living
room, too friable and black to whisk away.
We tried to bleach out the past.
Did your run-of-the-mill do-over
to lift its face: fresh mortar, two-by-fours
sanded smooth, painted. Then both brick
mouths, their chimney-deep throats cleared
of choking creosote. We scraped and swept
its vaulted stacks, rectangular and tall, coated
with tar oil and coal dust. Not a trace remained.
We lit candles that steeped the air
with sandalwood incense. A fresh start.
The house once again could breathe.
Hickory and oak logs stoked, the hot smoke
of its soul rose above. We felt the heat.
John C. Mannone has poems in Windhover, North Dakota Quarterly, Poetry South, Baltimore Review, and others. He won the Dwarf Stars Award (2020); was awarded an HWA Scholarship (2017) and a Jean Ritchie Fellowship (2017) in Appalachian literature; and served as celebrity judge for the National Federation of State Poetry Societies (2018). He has five full-length collections, the latest, Dark Wind, Dark Water, a novella-length horror fiction collection, is forthcoming from Mind’s Eye Publishing. He edits poetry for Abyss & Apex and Silver Blade. He’s a professor of physics and a nuclear consultant.
Social Media: http://jcmannone.wordpress.com, https://www.facebook.com/jcmannone/
No Trace of What Used to Be, What Could Have Been
Her broken heart swells full with grace
each time she hears his name.
Still, forgiveness feels out of place.
Dawn blooms, and the sodden light will erase
all the myriad reasons for this shame.
Her broken heart swells full with grace.
Loneliness fills the empty space.
He swore his love was not a game.
And so, forgiveness feels out of place.
She wonders how long her brain will chase
all the ways she might’ve snuffed the flame.
Her broken heart swells full with grace.
In the empty rooms, there is no trace
Of a future we -- only clotted blame.
Her broken heart swells full with grace
But forgiveness no longer dwells in this place.
Gwen Mullins’ work has been selected for the Best Mystery Stories of the Year: 2022, and her stories and essays have been featured in New Ohio Review, African American Review, The Bitter Southerner, The New Guard, PANK, and Green Mountains Review, among others. She is currently working on her second novel as well as a short story collection. In the winter of 2020-21, she served as the Writer in Residence for the Kerouac Project in Orlando. She teaches at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, and she holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She also teaches creative writing courses through the Tennessee Department of Corrections as well as through SoLit’s (formerly Southern Literary Alliance) Youth Outreach Program. She has been a freelance editor for business publications, cookbooks, creative non-fiction, and fiction for over ten years.
https://gwenmullins.com/
The Monthly Contests rotate through a pattern of Poetry, Fiction, and Creative Nonfiction throughout the year, with a new theme each month. Go to the 2025 Monthly Contest Series Info page to view the genre and theme for each month.
This contest is free to enter for members of the Chattanooga Writers’ Guild. To become a member, click HERE
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