Charles “Chip” Kilmon of Mathews has been named a semifinalist in a national poetry contest sponsored by the online poetry roundtable “Poetry Nation.”

As one of 300 semifinalists out of 50,000 entrants, Kilmon said his poem will be published in an anthology by the veteran-owned Eber & Wein Publishing, parent company of Poetry Nation. The anthology is due for release in February, he said.

The poem he wrote, “Darkness,” was written in memory of a friend who died. It tells of unnamed people sitting “… in the corner by themselves … Their eyes glazed over in their head … a lifelessness in their eyes” and of their unseen struggle “for their very life.” It urges us to give such people support and let them know they are loved before “… the Darkness that they have feared so great … Has taken another from us once again.”
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