He’d stand at the corner of the street and draw the pouch from his travel pack, sprinkling birdseed for the doves. He was their commander: the birds came when he called, when his violin cried out for them, and they’d coo in his ear while rustling their feathers against his skin.
– The Birds Came When He Called, by Summer Bowie-Smith
SOLON– “Mama gave me a wet kiss on the cheek and a paper bag soaked with grease. Leftovers from her late night shift: stale fries, fried chicken charred at the bottom of the fryer.”
So begins The Birds Came When He Called, a short story by Solon Middle School eighth-grader Summer Bowie-Smith.
Bowie-Smith, 13, was the 2021 Write Now winner for seventh and eighth grades in the University of Iowa (UI) Flash Writing Contest held earlier in the year.
“I’d been looking at entering some writing competitions for a while, and since this one was localized for Iowa, I thought it might be nice because it was kind of a state thing, more familiar to me,” she explained. “It was also the first writing contest I’d ever entered so I thought that might just be a nice local thing to get into.”
Bowie-Smith learned of the contest through language arts teacher Kerri Coons.
More than 540 UI alumni and others from around the world submitted entries in January during the timed, online short story competition.
Participants were asked to create a story of 1,000 words or less, using one of two sets of prompts announced Friday, Jan. 15: a story incorporating a musician and a dove, or a story incorporating an arborist and a lighthouse.
Contestants had 48 hours to complete the assignment and enter it into one of five categories from third grade to adult.
Bowie-Smith considered the prompts for a while, wanting to offer something unique since all authors would be tackling the same subjects.
“You’ve got to try and stand out at least,” she noted.
She chose the musician and the dove.
Musicians evoked images of instruments like the saxophone and a more industrial age, she said, while the dove was more a part of the natural world for Bowie-Smith.
It reminded her of being close to the roots of an artisan and she thought about doing a starving-artist kind of journey.
“But in this case, it was someone who was homeless,” she added.
In The Birds Came When He Called, the narrator encounters a street musician on a sidewalk corner by a metro station and finds himself returning again and again to watch Edmond play for the birds.
Bowie-Smith spent about half a day to get the idea solidified and outlined.
“It took a while because I wanted to be sure I was getting it all right,” she said. “The second day was just writing and revising until I found something I liked.”
The contest took place just after the resumption of classes from winter break, and entrants were told it would take a month before the winners were announced.
She was in her language arts classroom when she learned the results.
She opened up her computer, went to the website and saw her name there.
Bowie-Smith texted her parents and informed her teacher.
“It was hard to believe because my story was against 70 other students,” she observed. “I didn’t really think I could do something like that. Seeing that I could, that I could be recognized, it gave me a bit of confidence, I suppose.”
Judges spent weeks reading submissions from 31 states and as far away as Tanzania and Japan. The participant names for all submissions were removed before three rounds of anonymous judging. After the winning submissions were chosen, participants’ names were revealed.
Winners in each of the grade categories receive an Iowa-themed writing prize pack and a $20 Amazon gift card. The winner of the adult category received an Iowa-themed writing prize pack, one book of their choice written by an author from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and a handcrafted wooden pen made from a tree that was located on the UI campus.
Bowie-Smith has wanted to write for as long as she can remember.
Her grandmother wrote a lot when she was younger, “so it’s been in my blood for a long time.”
She’s hopeful people will understand the point she was trying to make.
“There are so many different people out there and their appearances can be so different than who they actually are on the inside,” she said. “I feel like there’s beauty inside of everyone and you should always try to, you know, take a chance on someone, see what’s inside them.”
Next year’s UI Flash Writing Contest will take place Jan.14-16, 2022.
In the meantime, read the tales from 2021 winners at www.foriowa.org/write-now/.
2021 Write Now Flash Writing Contest winning stories:
Grades 3 and 4: Witch Doctor, Cora B., Iowa.
Grades 5 and 6: The Flyer, Emma H., Iowa.
Grades 7 and 8: The Birds Came When He Called, Summer B., Iowa.
Grades 9-12: The Blue Dove, Grace B., Minnesota.
Adult: Mourning Doves, Trudy Nielsen Kimble 95BA, 97MAT, Nebraska.