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Scoring Rubric for Poetry: Please X 



UNDERSONG         5 4 3 2 1

I will give you whispers 

ripe from a branch – 


UNDERNEATH         5 4 3 2 1

The coldness in my bones

has not left (since I was ten).


UNDERSCORED         5 4 3 2 1

Growing up, I worked in a larder,

serving oranges bitter to the taste.


UNDERCURRENTS         5 4 3 2 1

I remember when I mugged a man,        

tears coupled with the evening sky,

eyes the color of rain – tap, tap, tap.


UNDERSTATEMENT        5 4 3 2 1

They remember me 

as a series of sounds.


UNDERPRIVILEGED 5 4 3 2 1

To see the world, a muddled 

beauty, I taped my eyelids open.




Total Point(s)  _______ / 30


 

Laine Derr holds an MFA from Northern Arizona University and has published interviews with Carl Phillips, Ross Gay, Ted Kooser, and Robert Pinsky. Recent work has appeared or is forthcoming from Chapter HouseZYZZYVAHollins CriticOxford MagazinePrairie Schooner, and elsewhere.

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