2024 Bucks County
High School Poet of the Year Competition Winners
Entries from all over the County were judged by current Poet Laureate Tara Tamburello, and last year's Laureate Tom Mallouk.
Winner: Cecilia Shine, Neshaminy High School, 12th Grade
“One Heart Too Many,” “The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine,” “It Must Be a Dream”
1st Runner-up: Jack DeBoyace, Central Bucks High School East, 10th Grade
“Amy, a Wind,” “Again Pangaea,” “I Love You Sierra Star”
2nd Runner-up: Kade Booker, Neshaminy High School, 12th Grade
“The Whole Forest a Grave,” “When Soup Comes to Shove, There Is,” “Can I Be a Different Piece of Your Picture”
3rd Runner-up: Olivia Cao, Central Bucks High School South, 12th Grade
“Ode to My Mother,” “Better Late Than Never,” “Dear Perfectionism”
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Announcing the 2023 Bucks County Poet Laureate, Tara Tamburello
Tara was raised in Bucks County, along the bank of the Neshaminy Creek. Her poetry and prose have appeared in Ghost City Review, Bone Parade, Rust + Moth, and other journals, as well as in anthologies by Vestal Review and Sans. PRESS. She is a past winner of the Bucks County Short Fiction Contest and was a runner-up for the poet laureate competition in 2021. She lives in Langhorne with her husband, two children, and cat, and she works on the Law School Admission Council (LSAC)'s marketing team. Aside from writing, she enjoys gardening, playing video games and music, hiking, and painting. You can find more of her work at taratamburello.com.
Here’s what our final judge, Joanna Fuhrman, had to say about Tara’s work:
The language in these poems is no-nonsense and full of verve and swerve. The voice is idiosyncratic, reflecting a poet with a wry voice and a vision capable of looking into the future and the past at the same moment. I admire the speed at which these poems move, the range of themes, and the freshness of the imagery and phrasing.
