Leonard L. Milberg ’53 High School Poetry Prize 伦纳德·L·米尔伯格'53高中诗歌奖旨在挖掘美国或国外的11年级学生的杰出文学创作，竞赛由普林斯顿大学的刘易斯艺术中心（Lewis Center for the Arts）举办。本比赛的评委会由普林斯顿大学写作系的成员组成，如Michael Dickman，Yiyun Li，Paul Muldoon，James Richardson，Tracy K. Smith，Susan Wheeler和Monica Youn。
Lewis Center for the Arts
刘易斯艺术中心是以已故的Peter B. Lewis（1933年-2013年）命名的。刘易斯先生是普林斯顿大学1955届的毕业生，也是大学的前特许理事，他在2006年向大学捐赠了1.01亿美元，开创了普林斯顿大学艺术的新时代。
普林斯顿大学的创意写作、舞蹈、音乐剧、戏剧、视觉艺术和跨学科工作室等课程组成了刘易斯艺术中心（Lewis Center for the Arts）。该中心通过每年举办100多场公开演出、展览、读书会、电影放映和讲座，为校园和更广泛的普林斯顿地区社区服务，其中大部分是免费的。
重要地位
伦纳德·L·米尔伯格'53高中诗歌奖是普林斯顿设置的诗歌比赛，获奖诗歌可以在arts.princeton.edu上发表。比赛全程由普林斯顿大学教授评判。参与该诗歌比赛可以和世界各地同龄学生一起交流诗歌，隔空与普林斯顿大学教授碰撞诗歌文化。参赛要求
年龄要求：各国的11年级高中生
其他要求：每个学生可以提交3首诗，没有字数要求
学生需要在官网提交作：首先在官网指定的地方复制好作品，再上传PDF版本（需要提交两次）
文件名格式为（名-姓-poems)
PDF文件的每一页都要标注参赛者名字、家庭地址、邮箱地址、手机号、在读高中名称以及学校电话。
官网提交：
https://arts.princeton.edu/leonard-milberg-high-school-poetry-prize-submissions/
参赛时间
竞赛提交将于 2021 年 11 月 1 日开始，截止日期为 11 月 28 日晚上 11:59（美国东部时间）
奖项设置
获奖作品都将在官网上展示，一等奖到三等奖作品可以下载下来研读。
一等奖：奖金500美元
二等奖：奖金250美元
三等奖：奖金100美元
荣誉奖：获奖诗歌名称展示在官网上
备赛资料
竞赛希望有积极性的学生能够选择参加比赛，并希望他们能够将诗歌的写作和分享视为一种乐趣，而不是一种义务。
推荐阅读下列诗歌选本：
Poem-a-Day: 365 Poems for Every Occasion, edited by Tamar Brazis20th Century Pleasures, edited by Robert HassThe Best of the Best American Poetry, edited by Robert Pinsky
2021获奖作品欣赏
Olivia Yang
Charlotte, North Carolina
Etymology of Loss
The day my mother died, I opened
my copy of the Tibetan Book of Living
and Dying for the first time. I stroked
each page, the soft fur of age glistening
between my fingers. Perhaps
the deepest reason why we are afraid of death
is that we do not know who we are. It is time now
to admit my mother’s death to be two
deaths, the first in her chamber of body,
the second in a glass room
in my mind. Her departure left a silence
underneath the trembling
of my skin, which swallowed
grief as quickly as a reassurance
that this was anything but finality.
I want to think of death as a metaphor
about empty space. Yet even a ghost will gnaw
at its coffin. When it’s packed too tightly
together, there’s a thickness to dust
I’d never noticed before. Like the birth
day cake I ate at seven — a diabetic sweetness
smudged in icing, recoiling
from the skin of my throat.
I drag the knife across glazed flesh
tenderly, as if to rouse the body
slumbering beneath frosted casing.
A sprig of pale lily rests on my platter –
no, wilts upon a coffin. The light goes out.
The flicker of an exhausted wick lingers, butane
licking the corners of my mother’s withering
lilac lips. I cannot remember
if she was there to witness the feast.
What does death do with the body
it discards? The same that we do
with the things we do not want. Mother,
when I try to capture your face, I can only remember
your cheekbones outlining a mouth
downturned, flushed in the rouge of anger.
When I try to grieve, I open
the same book and highlight with a pen
the words that can border you
in your wake — a cold body still
stuck, clinging onto caking ash.
But what is this? A revival? Or an erasure?
To contain you, I created a room
which was also a ghost. The distance between
you and I — faceless. I keep forgetting
empty space can also be a door
and even now, I wish I could enter
and exit freely.
But I know this is not an elegy
for I still do not know the words
that can contain you.
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