2019 Poetry Competition Winners
THE WINNERS ARE IN …
First, Friends of Falun Gong thanks all its poet participants. We received some great submissions in the adult category. It was a delight to read so many touching and well-crafted poems. Our list of contest winners and honorable mentions are below, with easy, clickable links to the poems. We happily publish these poems today to help commemorate World Falun Dafa Day, 2019.
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ADULT AWARDS
1st Place – $500
David Whippman, “For Falun Gong”
2nd Place – $250
Randal A. Burd, “Indoctrinating Evil”
3rd Place – $100
Theresa Rodriguez, “CCP and Falun Gong Sonnet”
4th Place
Dusty Thorne, “The Cost of Our Silence”
Honorable Mentions | Adult
Izuchukwu Saviour Otubelu, “Letter to Mei Xing”
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Due to a low number of submissions in the College and High School categories, those categories were canceled this year.
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Contest Judges
Evan Mantyk, President of The Society of Classical Poets
(with additional helpful eyes from the FoFG Editorial Staff)
Note from the Editors: most of these poems were written by poets who just recently learned about Falun Gong and the persecution. While we recognize and commend these poems as voices of support, they do not represent Falun Gong itself or even the views of FoFG as an organization. For a genuine understanding of the practice, one would have to explore the teachings at their very source.