River of Words: Poetry

Contest Winners | Resources

2007 Grand Prize Winners and Finalists

Poetry submissions are judged by River of Words co-founders Robert Hass, who served as US Poet Laureate from 1995-1997, and writer Pamela Michael. We award four Grand Prizes in poetry every year to United States contestants, in four different age categories. In addition, about 50 finalists are selected each year from the tens of thousands of entries we receive from the US and other countries.

You may look at poems from other years by using the menu below.

**View Yearly Poetry Winners and Finalists**
2007	2006	2005	2004	2003	2002
2001	2000	1999	1998	1997	1996

Rivers

Jose Perez, age 7
Sarasota, Florida
Fruitville Elementary
Teacher: Lauren Johnson

Grand Prize Winner
Category I
Grades K-2

New Beginnings

Shyann Graham, age 11
Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Fulton School
Teacher: Barbara Strasko

Grand Prize Winner
Category II
Grades 3-6

7 Haiku on Goldfish and Why

Maddy Johnson, age 14
Bar Harbor, Maine
Submitted Independently

Grand Prize Winner
Category III
Grades 7-9

1717 Picayune St.

Billy Creed, age 18
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
LSU Lab School
Teacher: Candence Robillard

Grand Prize Winner
Category IV
Grades 10-12

Sowing

Rachel Kim, age 16
Saratoga, California
Submitted Independently

Shasta Bioregion Prize
Awarded to a San Francisco Bay Area student

Finalists

Ode to the Bee, Karen Aguilar

Colorful Shooting Star Night, Carlos Alameda

An Endless Rhythm, Devan Allard

Weeping Willow, Phoebe Arnold

The Little River, Evelin Avila

Layer Cake, Nicholas Boykin

Summer in the South, Olivia Brown

The Voice of a River, Sarah Beth Comfort

Save the Water, Save the Future, Dakota Daniels

Great Blue, Caroline Dean

Gutter Duty, Jenny Fan

3 haiku, Maggie Gallagher

Ode to the Fern, Mehrnush Golriz

Midnight, Madeline Goodfriend

The Keys, Gail Harmata

I Was Raised by Clouds, Ivy Herr

Dancing Rays, Hannah Holiday

Breathing Vermont, Clarkie Hussey

Bird, Noah Jordan

A hungry spider, Lucio Kim-Murakami

Talking Trees, Erin Kopal

I Come From a Fire Breathing Dragon, Meagan Le

Worship, Lesther Lopez

The Life Beat, Hendrik Matthysen

A Cinquain to Pucketa Creek, Carmita J. McGeary

Untitled, Angela Meza

On the Basin, Meagan Michalk

The Old River, Teri Mueller

Collected to Stay, Evan Nelsen

If I were in Charge of the World…, Francisco Javier Pineda

The Barcode of Nature, Jacob Rainey

At Centennial Olympic Park, Shalini Ramachandran

With the Flow, Maddie Roach

North Carolina, Jalesha Robertson

Belting Broadway, Sarah Jordan

and nature lives, Christopher Schlaepfer

Hiss, John Davies-Schley

Is There a Place to Rest my Soul?, Crystal Schwaigert

My Name is Elijah, Elijah Soza

Black Hole Diary, Abbey Tadros

Destroying Nature, Meeya Tjiang

Luna, mi luna, Silvia Valle

Shanxi River, Michael Zhang

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