The Shadow
CLIFTON FORGE – Ray Allen, director of the Alleghany Highlands Poetry Workshop, has won a first place in the 2009 Poems Written After Midnight: The Deborah Madden Memorial poetry contest sponsored by the Green River Writers based in Louisville, Ky.
He also won a second place award for his poem “Night Wind” and a 1st place honorable mention for “Relics of War” in the Green River writing contest.
Allen’s free verse poem which won first place in the Poems Written After Midnight category entitled “Freedom Fighter” was written about Captain Landon Ray Allen, his son, who is an F-18 Hornet pilot in the U.S. Marine Corps. Landon Ray has served his country since 1996, including three tours of duty overseas, two in Japan and one in Afghanistan.
A graduate of Alleghany High School, Capt. Allen is also a graduate of Virginia Military Institute, Lexington.
“Freedom Fighter” finished as the winning poem ahead of “War Child,” the second place entry by Adele K. Ule of Louisville, Ky. Sheri Wright of Louisville won third place and first honorable mention by entering “Closure” and “Grandfather’s Funeral.” Becky Alexander of Cambridge, Ontario, won 2nd honorable mention for “After the Legend,” and Brian Wettlaufer of Franklin, Wis., won 3rd honorable mention for “Another Fitful Night.” Cash prizes were awarded for the top three entries.
Allen is the author of three books of poetry: “The Roads I Travel,” Nightshade Press, Troy, Maine, 1990; “Between the Thorns: Windcarver Songs of Appalachia,” Road Publishers, Fairfax Station, 1991, and “Beyond Star Bottom and Other Poems,” Mountain Empire Publications, Clifton Forge, 2000.
He made his debut as a poet by serving as a featured reader at the opening ceremony for the Douglass House Center in Long Beach, Calif. in 1968.
The University of Tennessee Press published Encyclopedia of Appalachia in 2006, and the publication featured Allen as a poet and Appalachian activist. Morehead State University’s Alumni Hall of Fame inducted Allen as its 80th member in 1991 for his literary achievements, career in education and community service work with Appalfolks of America Association, a non-profit corporation he founded in 1985 to preserve Appalachian heritage through drug-free creativity programs in the literary and performing arts.
Allen has won more than two dozen poetry awards, including the Herbert T. Harris Poetry Award, Shawnee Hills Spring Blank Verse Award, Shawnee Hills Spring Free Verse Award, Claude M. Law Memorial Poetry Contest and Woodrow Hale Memorial Prize for Poetry.
As a featured reader, Allen has read his poetry at Center in the Square, Paramount’s Kings Dominion, Radford University, Berea College, The Kentucky Highlands Folk Festival, The Mountain Heritage Festival, Appalshop, Douthat State Park and several book stores.
His poetry has been anthologized in publications such as “Old Wounds, New Words,” and his poems have been published from coast to coast in publications including “Black Times,” “Appalachian Heritage,” “Appalachian Legacy,” “Appalachian Voices,” “Pine Mountain Sand and Gravel,” “Breadbasket with the Blues,” “Image,” “Poet’s Domain,” “Potato Eyes” and “Westwind.”
Allen entered four poems in four contests sponsored by the Green River Writers, and “Night Wind,” another of his free verse poems, won a cash prize for second place in The Tell It Slant Poetry Contest. “Relics of War,” another free verse poem, won first honorable mention in A Breath of Merton Poetry Contest.
Allen said, “The Alleghany Highlands Poetry Workshop that is held on the last Monday of each month at 6 p.m. in the Clifton Forge Public Library is an outreach of Appalfolks of America, and more than 20 writers have participated during the past two years.”
He went on to say that the workshop is free and open to the public. The workshop is conducted for any writer, high school and beyond, who wants to hone literary skills as a poet or songwriter.
As for winning The Deborah Madden Memorial Poetry Contest, Allen remarked, “I feel fortunate to have won with a poem that I wrote about my son who is currently flying the T-34 jet as an instructor at Whiting Field in Milton, near Pensacola.”
Allen is married to Cherie Davis Allen, a graduate of Alleghany County High School who won the title of Miss Virginia in 1968 and finished as a top ten finalist in the Miss America Pageant.
The couple resides in Wesgate. Ray Allen is retired from the Alleghany County School System where he taught and coached for many years at Alleghany High School. He is currently owner of The Buckhorn Country Store on Douthat Road in Alleghany County.
In addition to Landon Ray, the Allens have three daughters: Jana Cherie, an actress In Wilmington, N. C.; Amber Suzanne Dean, a cosmetologist who operates The Amber Suzanne Salon at the Buckhorne Country Store and Campground; and Anmarie, a student at Dabney S. Lancaster Community College.
Following is Allen’s poem which won first place.
Freedom Fighter
Look from the sky
as you climb above the hilltops.
Look past your silver wings
to where we wait
for your return.
Look for us beyond the clouds
for we will be waiting
like honeysuckle blossoms
ready to share the nectar that we have.
And when night stars
reflect in your eyes,
remember that your flight
cannot separate us,
for you fly above the earth
with part of us
traveling with you,
the part we gave
when love glistened
brighter than anything,
even the glint of sun
that would one day
leap from the wings
we pinned on your chest.
And when you roll on high
and speed from sky toward sea,
know that with each dive
you become part of a legacy–
the one that keeps us free.
Return to us from the sky
and know that while we wait,
we are very proud.
