Category: Poetry Contests

The Second Dare by Ryan Boggs

Blondin Performing a Stunt on the Tightrope at Niagara Falls, 1860. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress

Blondin Performing a Stunt on the Tightrope at Niagara Falls, 1860. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress

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Source: Ryan Boggs, 2026

This poem won an Honourable Mention in the Niagara Falls Poetry Project 25th Anniversary Poetry Competition. It will be published with all the other entrants in a print anthology to be published by Phylum Press. To reserve a copy of the anthology please email aporteus@niagarapoetry.ca. A companion volume exploring the poetry over 6 centuries will also soon be available, and may be reserved ahead of time.

Ryan Boggs is a writer and teacher living in southern Ontario      

 

Before I Met Niagara by Kunal Sharma

sharma
Kunal Sharma

My first lesson in water
was not from a map.

I stood a little apart
while my brother
placed my grandfather into the Ganga.

At Har Ki Pauri,
a priest kept chanting Sanskrit shlokas
without looking up.

The water felt high that day
but the river stayed calm.

That calmness felt strange to me.

Temple bells rang from far away—
not loud, just continuing.

It felt like a sound
meant to say goodbye
when words are not enough.

Later, in Delhi,
I saw another river in passing.

The Yamuna
moving through dust and distance,
as if it had learned
not to expect attention.

Then one day—
a photograph.

Niagara.

I did not understand it at first.

Just water
breaking its own edge
and refusing to stop.

I have never stood there.

But I see it like this:

people leaning hard on railings,
wind pulling at their sleeves,
mist already stuck on skin
before anyone notices.

The sound would not feel like water.

It would feel like something constant
hitting the air.

And beyond it—

the Horseshoe Falls
curving wide,
as if the earth has opened
and forgotten to close again.

I think of how water behaves.

At Har Ki Pauri,
it carried ash, prayer, silence—
And kept moving as if nothing had changed.

At Niagara,
it keeps falling
as if falling is the only thing it knows.

One day I will stand there.

I will not arrive empty.

That moment at the river
will already be inside me—

the priest’s voice,
the bells from far away,
my brother’s hands steady in water,
and me standing aside
not knowing where to look.

All of it
moving quietly together
when I finally face that falling water.

Source: The author, 2026

Kunal Sharma is a poet from Delhi, India. He explore memory, travel, and the emotional presence of landscapes in his writing.

This poem won an Honourable Mention in the Niagara Falls Poetry Project 25th Anniversary Poetry Competition. It will be published with all the other entrants in a print anthology to be published by Phylum Press. To reserve a copy of the anthology please email aporteus@niagarapoetry.ca

 

 

 

 

The Place Where Countries Lean Close by Kunal Sharma

kunal
Kunal Sharma

I came from another part of the world
to see Niagara as a tourist.

But Niagara does not feel unfamiliar.

It feels like something I have already known
without being able to explain where.

A child is running near the edge of sight,
not looking at the Falls for long.

He is more interested in his brother,
in the way they keep running
as if the ground belongs to them.

No one tells them to stop.

They just keep moving
as children do
when something larger is nearby
but not more important than play.

I stand there longer than I expected.

At one point, a sudden gust of wind
pushes the mist into my face.

For a second, I cannot see the Falls at all.
Only water in the air.
Only breath becoming wet.

Then it clears again,
and nothing has changed.

I lower my phone without meaning to.
I do not take the picture I was about to take.

I notice a piece of driftwood
caught in the metal of a railing,
held there as the water keeps pulling below—
a quiet struggle between structure and force
that does not end either way.

For a moment, I find myself looking
for something that looks like damage—
a pause, a weakness, a break in the rush—
but everything holds too firmly,
even in motion.

The ground hums beneath my shoes,
a low pressure I feel more than hear,
as if the earth is carrying something
too large to explain in stillness.

The water does not change
because I am watching it.

It keeps falling
as if it has been doing this
long before anyone arrived
to name it.

People take pictures
and then leave slowly.

Some look back once,
as if checking whether it is still there.

It is.

It does not move closer.
It does not move away.

Niagara does not feel like a place I am visiting.

It feels like something
that has been present in me
without asking permission.

Not a mother.
Not a symbol.

Just something steady
that lets everything else move freely
around it.

I walk back toward the parking lot,
my phone still dark in my pocket,
carrying the cold, wet weight of the air
that will eventually dry
but never leave.

Source: Kunal Sharma, 2026.

Kunal Sharma is a poet from Delhi, India. He explores memory, travel, and the emotional presence of landscapes in his writing.

This poem won an Honourable Mention in the Niagara Falls Poetry Project 25th Anniversary Poetry Competition. It will be published with all the other entrants in a print anthology to be published by Phylum Press. To reserve a copy of the anthology please email aporteus@niagarapoetry.ca

Please join me at Local on the Niagara Falls Night of Art

night of art

Please join me at Local on Thursday, September 17, from 7pm-9pm for an open mic event.

 

This event is being held during the Niagara Falls Night of Art 2026 celebration. The Local is a few steps south of The Exchange campus, the principal Night of Art venue.

 

We’re hoping to announce the short list of finalists for the Niagara Falls Poetry Project 25th Anniversary Poetry Contest, as well as reading some of them.

 

If you’d like to read a couple of your poems, please drop a line to aporteus@niagarapoetry.ca 

 

Hope to see you there!

Directions to Local

The Contest is finished!

finished
The 25th Anniversary Poetry Contest submission period has now finished. Thanks to all of the people who submitted their poems.

Poems came from across North America, with others from the United Kingdom, Sweden, India, Indonesia, and a few that I don’t know where they’re from.

The poems are now going into the judges’ hands for scoring. Once they come back to me I will tally the scores and then be able to announce the winners. The winners’ poems will be added to the website at that point. I don’t envy the judges during the scoring process. There were so many good poems that were entered it will be hard to make a decision.

As the judging is being done I will be selecting and compiling the poems into book format (depending on the size and cost of the book not all entires may necessarily be added to the book). That will be completed after the winners are announced, and the manuscript will be sent to Phylum Press to complete the printing process, with the publication date to be announced later. We will be taking advance orders.

After the book is published the non-winning entries will be added to the website. 

Once again, thanks to all of the poets from around the world who entered the contest.