Our wonderful judges have made their selections and the votes are in!

The winners of The Best of You Poetry Contest are...

First Place

The Best of Yougingerly
  i trace your frozen features
  with trembling fingertips,

i remember this day well,
  so very well;

     your typical smile curling
     the corners of your mouth,
        and that ever present
        mischievous spark
     in your almond eyes,

     the way paint splattered
     every available surface
     of your over-sized clothes,
        even your explanation for
        wearing those still echoes
           like yesterday in my mind;

           "how can an artist create
           or express himself,
           if he cannot move freely?"

        those scattered escaped dots
        of red and yellow p by ~Lady-Yume

Second Place

metalsweet melody, unconditional autonomy;
break my bones and cast them in gold.
pour oil in my veins. make it bleed.

i don’t need a heart.
i don’t need feelings.
i don’t need skin and muscle.

fire me, pull me, bend me to perfection,
vicious raw power. mould my vision
i am something more than human.

tendons of electricity ripple, flex
breathe in no air, no sound
aside from a background buzz -

i am the best of all, the best of
my kind, your kind, every kind
i will not be kind. by =dirked

Third Place

Unexplainable feelingThis cryptic feeling that I’m feeling inside

I don’t know its meaning but it has caught my eyes

I’ve only felt it once, but it’s been made very clear

That since the first time I met you I’ve hold you dear

And it’s so vivid; it’s strange but also great

It’s close to unexplainable, and gentle as a dove

But only few, barely anyone could relate

That the best of her is that she showed me love by ~GentlePeace

Honorable Mentions

The Moon is HumanThe moon understands what it means
To be human
Its imperfections,
Craters,
Are open to our criticism.

And yet the wolves howl
At its beauty and strength.

The wolf understands what it means
To be left out
To belong in a pack,
Then abandoned,
Having to carry their own weight.

And yet the moon shines
To make the trip less lonesome.

Is life about finding the wolf
That howls the loudest
And the longest?

Is life about finding the moon
That shines the brightest
And the farthest?

The human understands what it means
To be hurt by words
Their labels,
Isolation,
Keeps them divided.

And yet the friend supports
When feet seem disfunctional.

The fr Anas platyrhynochosi think i’ve found the best of you
       (and me)
in ducks.

“ducks mate for life,” you said,
which might not even be true
but we pretend that it is
just to believe that something out there doesn’t die

we make geography in the meniscus of the sea
which might not even exist
twin mountain ranges stretching
away from a single point, never touching
the loneliest hills
and in the end
we haven’t disturbed anything more than a breath

in the sunlight i see your colors
the grassgreen shadow on your neck
which might not even be there
some trick of evolution
and your bones are filled with something
more like air and le Suicide LetterA pencil can t  w i r  l as fast as your eye can w   a t    c  h it.
As l   o   n   g as you k ee p it in control you have no fear.

I watch mine r  o   l l past my cold fi  ng  er  s.
T w  i  r l
and
t
    u
 m
        b
   l
               e
d
 o
    w
       n

the b r i c k walls of my mind it
f
a
l
l
s
and
f         o         t         .
    l         a         s

Alice in her rabbit hole never got t      h     a    t   f  a r.
Neither will what I try to write for you
but if I try
if I try
and fail like I always do
will you still read it?

I'll get n      o     w    h   e  r e without my b  r e  a t  h .
But I will get f a  r   The Best of YouI love the dimples that frame your bright smile.
I want to just enjoy the best of you for a while.  
You've always known just what words to say.
No one else could ever make me feel this way.

I love the way your iridescent eyes shine.
It's beautiful when they reflect the love in mine.
I love hearing you quietly whisper my name.
If someone else says my name it's not the same.

I love listening to the sound of your voice.
If I was to pick again you would be my first choice.
I love the way you listen, love, and care.
You're the kind of person who will always be there.

You love me for not who I've been or what I will be.
You simply love A bottle, a piece of paper, some wordsThings that remind me of you:

The night sky.

The dark.
Winter.
The rumbling of thunder that follows lightning.

When my music, for some reason,
is on shuffle and I hear a song
that I used to listen to
two or three years ago.

Dark blue, grey and black.
Black, yellow and grey.

How my fingers get harder to move,
yet still I carry on typing,
and the muted excited happiness
that moves under the keys.

… … …

I think of you day to day
and how you crumble under my
hands in the strangest fashion –
not beautiful, but something like it.
I can watch the shards fall for
days, weeks,
and every time I blink you’ll
be Help Yourself To More Tea
Why, hello there, darling.
Had a feeling you'd come.
Have a seat. I've got tea.
Got lots to catch up on,
You and me.

I hear you've got troubles.
Got a thorn in your side,
Got a stick in the mud,
Why, I'm sure, my sweet one,
Got a feeling you're sick
Of an ever-looping sad song.

Oh honey, let me tell you,
It's short,
Sweet,
But chock full of vitamins
And some other not-so-convenient things.

I hear you've been rushed.
You wanna make a name,
Make a change, but dear,
My dear, my dear,

I hardly understand where you're going
in such a great hurry.

All that worrying about the future
And worrying about the past…
I

All entries can be found in the folder below!
[link]

Prizes!
First Place
3 Month dA Subscription or 636 Points from *TheFinalHikari
100 Points from =Christianonfire7
Free poetry commission from =Christianonfire7
Free drawn request and journal feature from =Operia
Free literature commission, llama, and critique on piece of the winner's choice from ~Majcen007
Feature at #Writers--club
Feature at #xWritersUtopiax
Feature from =Christianonfire7
Feature and llama from ~linderel
Feature and llama from *Moonlit-Muse
Feature from =Ambiguous-Catharsis
Feature from *withinmeloveresides1


Second Place

1 Month dA Subscription or 396 Points from `OfOneSoul
50 Points from =Christianonfire7
Free poetry commission from =Christianonfire7
Free Drawn Request and journal feature from =Operia
Feature at #Writers--club
Feature at #xWritersUtopiax
Feature from =Christianonfire7
Feature and llama from ~linderel
Feature and llama from *Moonlit-Muse
Feature from =Ambiguous-Catharsis
Feature from *withinmeloveresides1


Third Place

25 Points from =Christianonfire7
20 Points from ~lilcutestarz
Free poetry commission from =Christianonfire7
Feature at #Writers--club
Feature at #xWritersUtopiax
Feature from =Christianonfire7
Feature and llama from ~linderel
Feature and llama from *Moonlit-Muse
Feature from =Ambiguous-Catharsis
Feature from *withinmeloveresides1

Honorable Mentions
Feature at #Writers--club
Feature at #xWritersUtopiax
Feature from =Christianonfire7
Feature and llama from ~linderel
Feature and llama from *Moonlit-Muse
Feature from =Ambiguous-Catharsis
Feature from *withinmeloveresides1

We want to thank everyone who entered this contest for doing such a wonderful job with their entries. With so many talented writers entering, it was very difficult to pick out the above winners.

We also greatly appreciate the contributions of all of our generous prize donors! Winners, please remember to contact the kind deviants who donated prizes to you.

And finally, we want to thank our judges!



Finally, to all of our wonderful participants and members, please remember to check out our new program, Synergy! We're helping writers work together to assist each other in improving, critiquing, and inspiring. This program is designed to give our members someone they can count on for help and readership by assigning participants in pairs. Each member in a pair will critique and guide the other, and pairs will take part in monthly projects or contests to test their improvement. All of the information can be found in the blogs below.

SynergyAbout Synergy
The Synergy program is designed to provide our members with somebody they can count on for help and readership. Instead of a critique folder which is constantly overloaded, and too few, too tired critics to manage it, we'll have our members critique and help each other. The goal is officially to establish a working relationship between two members which both can benefit from and use to realize their full literary talent, but unofficially we'd like for our members to become friends as well.
How does it work?
Members sign up by taking a vow to participate in the interests of personal and community growth. Participants are then assigned in pairs according to mutual interests and literary styles, and each person in a pair will act as a mentor and guide to the other. Participants will be responsible for critiquing their partner's work, and helping with editing and inspiration. Every month, pairs will take part in a club project or contest designed to test t Synergy Sign UpDear Live-Love-Write members,
Finally, it is time to begin signing up for the LLW Synergy program. This program is designed to give our members someone they can count on for help and readership by assigning participants in pairs. Each member in a pair will critique and guide the other, and pairs will take part in monthly projects or contests to test their improvement.
Details can be found here.
To sign up, please provide a comment on this journal with the following:
- a brief explanation of what you like and don't like to read and write
- any other information you'd like for us to keep in mind when assigning partners
- a link to a sample of your writing
- an agreement to participate in this event wholeheartedly in the interests of improving your writing and helping your partner improve theirs (the fancier your agreement, the more we like you!)
Sign up for this event will close temporarily on May 28th, and wil