We are as proud as brass buttons to announce that Taylor Coyle, our Murphy Writing Program Assistant, has won the 1st place poetry prize in the Richard Stockton College’s 5th Annual Jennifer Cakert Writing Awards. (Read Taylor’s award-winning poem, “The Science of Aging,” below.)
You can hear Taylor and the other prize winners read their poems and essays at Stockton College on Tuesday, April 8th at 6pm in Room F111. It’s free and refreshments will be served.
The Jennifer Cakert Writing Awards are sponsored by the Jan-ai Scholarship Fund, which has also enabled more than a dozen young writers to attend the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway.
The Science of Aging
by Taylor Coyle
Had I not accepted the forced rising
of body from bed each day,
I would have known
how short a single day can feel.
If I had wasted time stomping out stars,
skipping pebbles across Saturn’s rings,
I could have avoided the vacuousness
of reality. If I had stuck planets on sticks
and tasted them like lollipops before
I settled on living my rushed, Earthly life,
I might have become god-like,
licking up stardust for breakfast
and feeding on meteorites for dinner.
It’s said God without science is dumb
and science without God is blind,
but really, they are both deaf, and the same.
© Taylor Coyle
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Taylor Coyle, born and raised in South Jersey, is a strong advocate of the Oxford Comma. She was originally Murphy Writing’s intern before she started working part-time for us. She also works in a barbeque restaurant and currently attends the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey for Literature. In her spare time, she likes to catch up on sleep and write.
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