Alex Hollenberg Wins Poetry Contest

Congratulations to Professor Alex Hollenberg, who has won CV2’s prestigious 2-Day Poem Contest. The yearly contest challenges poets from all over the world to write a poem in 48 hours. The catch? Poems must include 10 specific words, as decided by the judges. This year’s list was, in a word, tricky: squirrels, quiz, concatenate, set, phosphenes, clasp, abyssalpelagic, brisk, syzygy, and gadding. Poets were not allowed to alter the words in any way – no tense shifts, suffixes, plurals, etc. “It was probably the most fun two days of writing I’ve had in a long time,” said Alex. “Pushing myself to use words I’d never think to use, finding a context in which they all sort of fit, was straight-up good for me.” According to contest judge Dessa Bayrock, Alex’s poem “makes the reader want to hold their breath, just as one might when watching a bird in a dare-devil dive towards the water.” Alex’s winning poem, “origin story, with crow,” can be found in the Fall 2023 issue of CV2.