It was meant to be poetry, but not prophetic. Nevertheless, Cate Marvin's World's Tallest Disaster (Sarabonde Books, $12.95) had a ring of prophecy to it.

        Published way the heck before 9-11, the cover shows a skyscraper in flames with wildly gesturing people trapped inside.

        But it's the stuff that Marvin, a 32-year-old doctoral candidate at the University of Cincinnati, wrote inside that really turned heads. Especially judges for the 10th annual Kate Tufts Discovery Award for an early-career poet of promise. Marvin copped the award, given annually by Claremont Graduate University in Southern California. It's worth a whopping $10,000.

        And despite the cover, physical disasters aren't what the book's about. It's about emotional disasters that men and women inflict on each other.

        Not bad for someone whose parents were pretty sure she'd never finish high school, let alone college.

        “I had a terrible time in school and almost failed,” she says. “Writing poetry was my only bright point. I started getting my poems published in the high school literary magazine, which was the only good thing I'd done to that point. That's what helped me get into college.”

        And how. Two master's degrees and a Ph.D. in waiting.

        She and her work will be honored April 26 at Claremont, where she'll share the stage with such heavyweights as New Yorker poetry editor Alice Quinn, Pulitzer Prize winner Jack Miles (God: A Biography) and Oscar-winner Kathy Bates.

        Oh, and Carl Phillips, winner of the $100,000 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, for The Tether.

        So, in Marvin's honor, one of these: ClapClapClap.

        Cartoon kings: As long as we're handing out ClapClapClaps, how about one for local editorial cartoonists Jim Borgman (Enquirer), Jeff Stahler (Post) and Mike Peters (Dayton Daily News). Turns out they're all over the 30th anniversary edition of Best Editorial Cartoons of the Year (Pelican, $14.95).

        The book, edited by cartoonist Charles Brooks, is some 400 examples of 2001's best work.

        A lot of which happened under Cincinnati's nose: Both Borgman and Peters are at the top, with five works reprinted — a few others also had five, but no one had more. Stahler had three.

        Dang good showing, 'eh?

        Seen around town: That would be Peter Witecki and Aneta Pisarek cutting a rug at Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati.

        So now you're thinking, who the heck are they? They're Poland's national ballroom dancing champions, currently living in Oxford and doing exhibitions here and there.

        Like when they turned up Saturday at ETC, which is currently playing Syncopation, about two immigrants who are laborers by day and dancers by night.

        The champs showed up for the show and, lo and behold, gave a demonstration in ETC's lobby. Cramped lobby, as one playgoer said, adding that “they must be really good when they have room to move.”

        No kidding.

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