Harry S Truman High School Poetry Contest/Scholarship

Students, Parents, and Staff,

My father’s name is Mark Harder. He graduated from Delhaas High School in 1978. He was never a poet until he had a heart attack and stroke on February 1, 2018. He has aphasia and low vision. He couldn’t speak, read, write, or process spoken words. His brother, John K. Harder, a graduate of Woodrow Wilson High School 1971, would take him to the aphasia conversation group, lunch, to Home Depot and Lowes’. My father told him that he was trying to write poetry as a therapeutical activity to cope with pain, loss of words, and low vision. They both laughed but John encouraged him to work hard on his speech and language. 

This is the Harry S Truman High School and John K. Harder

RESILIENCE IN VERSE POETRY SCHOLARSHIP.  

Judge Hannah Hornsey, graduate from the Communicative Sciences and Disorders at New York University and poet said, “the poet did a great job of choosing vocabulary that was powerful but worked sonically as well.”  Judge Kathryn Paulson, a seven-year Traumatic Brain Injury survivor and a member of the Thursday Night Poets at University of Brain Injury Alliance of Wisconsin, said,” I would definitely encourage all of the writers to keep writing and to keep submitting their work!” Judge Carmen Fought, Professor of Linguistics at Pitzer College and Poet said, “Out of all the poems we received, this is the most complex in terms of craft.”

#1 - Untitled (Rain Drop):  Wren Morales

#2 - Mother, Father Farewell:  Kathleen Olsen

#3 - The King and the Pawn:  Deion Wu

Honorable Mention

Jocelena Maldonado-Fox,

Jacalyn Clarke

Kyana Townes