2014 Ekphrasis Prize Winner

The Fall/Winter 2014 issue of Ekphrasis features the winner of the 2014 Ekphrasis Prize for Poetry, winning $500 and publication. Editors Laverne and Carol Frith announce that it was selected among “a very strong field of contenders.” The winner is Joseph Stanton for his “outstanding” poem “Thomas Dewing’s Lady with a Lute.” Here is a few stanzas from the beginning:

Dewing has a passion for the Lady with the lute
we cannot avoid
knowing that.

Though her almost classic face lifts to light
in full profile, her torso twists
ever so slightly

To show her décolleté,
her bosom surprisingly exposed
above her slender waist.

Men linger in front of this picture
in its corner of the National Gallery
till their wives pull them past.