2010 poetry competition winners

Our thanks go to Billy Collins and Brian Moses for reading every poem and selecting the winners. Our thanks too, of course, to everyone who sent a poem in. Please don’t be disheartened if you didn't win this time and keep on writing.

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Adult section - First prize

The Cutting by Maitreyabandhu, London

 

The cutting at the end of Crockets Lane

had a meadow on either side, a brow

fringed with blackthorn and a few sheep grazing

in sodden fields below.  It carried steam trains

up to Lapworth, before the Beeching Axe

closed the branch lines down; now it was

a brambled ‘v’ overrun with elderflowers

and buddleia.  We’d go there blackberrying,

filling colanders and plastic tubs –

the cutting was a good walk from the house,

almost far enough to tire the dogs.

I remember children on the embankment

carrying Union Jacks – silhouetted

against the sky like rows of little soldiers.

They came from all the local infant schools

because we’d heard the Queen would visit Henley

in the royal train.  But that can’t be right:

the line came up before I was even born,

only dad remembered steam trains huffing on it.

I took Stephen there one summer; we kicked up

dandelions and it was hot; we got those

sticky burrs stuck to our shorts and socks.

We were looking for somewhere we’d be safe

and out of sight, a cleft beside a pond,

and as we walked two pigeons clattered out.

We waded nettles that reached up to our chest.

I managed to lift his shirt and touch his side,

But he was scared and so was I.  And anyway

the train didn’t stop; we just stood there

on the platform while she thundered past.

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Adult section - Second prize

Finisterre by Edward Barker, London

 

Maybe we’ll meet each other one day

and I’ll ask why you keep that dried magnolia leaf

in an envelope in the drawer by your bed,

even though I know it is because

when the nights are that sticky, tarmac dark

and the muffled braille of traffic

draws you farther and farther away

from yourself, you might take it out

and bring it to your lips

and such a hush of silence will descend

down through your fingertips and up into your arms

at its touch, even though it’s brittle now

and so leathery it could break,

but you hold it cupped like water in the palms

because no one can see you

and bring it up to your mouth in a gesture of faith

and the leaf itself will never fail, ever, to release

that – was it May – afternoon almost drunk with pollen

flying crazily through the sun-spasmed leaves

- the silly dogs chasing their tails and sticks –

and the light as soft and gold as air-syrup,

and with your head nested

in that lap you were thinking then

this might even be that moment you could

hold onto forever, that moment

when you watched it fall

and caught it in mid air.

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Adult section - Third prize

In a Hawk’s Eyes by Roy Marshall, Leicestershire

 

for Andy Green

 

Every grade and shape of man made lens

is inferior to this, the quartz and amber set

that rests inside the kestrel’s head,

 

picks out the draft of moths wings, bisects

the vales of voles and follows the low bellied

furrows of a cat snatching after mayfly.

 

No wide angle will catch the breath that bows

a rabbit’s flank or find the sine wave of a weasel

Track through the geometry of plots.

 

No telescopic zoom will haul in a net of silverfish,

spot the printed silk of a butterfly’s flit, or lift

the blue-chrome mesh of a fly’s eye skyward.

 

No satellite in orbit can cleave a helix of gnats,

and the braille of ants across the slabs, or map

the reave of rats through a rice spill of larvae.

 

No mega pixel aerial photograph will trace a snail’s

aluminium road, reveal the delta of a fox’s spray,

or catalogue a mouse’s prey of grasshopper and louse.

 

A spy-plane won’t find the mole’s silo doorways,

pierce a pool’s platinum skin, or read the swelled

camouflage of a frog primed for launching.

 

No lurid thermal image will capture the jolt

to the shrew’s heart, or catch the snatched plum

of its shadow rising, beneath a drape of wings.

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Young persons' section - First prize

No Words Are Needed by Jasmine Mueller Hsia, Arizona

 

When the day is done,

She comes, alone,

A child, abandoned and forgotten

Weaving around boulders, skirting trees

With only the starlight to guide her

 

When she arrives, she sits, silent,

Beside the cascading waterfall

Staring into the silver pool,

Listening to the whispering wind

 

When the moon is high,

He comes, alone

A teal-green dragon, long and slim

Still young, yet lost to his people

As she is to hers

 

Children both, from different worlds

Friendless, alone, but for each other

She is human, he a dragon,

Meeting in secret, meeting in silence

No words are needed here

 

No words are needed

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Young persons' section - Second prize

Fine Lines by Ella Zhelong Mi, Peterborough

 

Think, when Roger Federer, world class player

Dances racket crown around the ball that

Pinches the line by a hundredth of an inch the

Commentator hails it – what a winner!

Then his opponent, ranked 108th

Lunges at the same but, dumps

It dead a millimetre astray that’s

Dubbed as – what a shank!

 

Imagine, a screwdriver in mother’s clasp,

Rasping drill through sloppy masks of plaster,

A pipeline choked which bursts into a brook,

A flood. The price: £2000 of tears.

 

Remember, single trail of ink beneath

Pageantry Trinity crest. The damning words

So normal trimmed from yesterday’s news

And yet together scores the line so fine

Between Success and Failure.

 

So when I scramble over cliff tops it

Shouldn’t pain me to see the little white

Sail, a shred of paper reflected off

Gleaming diamonds adorning summit waves.

 

Yet why I beg for all those little lines again, to strangle, mangle into a rope, to string that boat back?

 

Why must Galileo claim the Earth is round?

Why must Newton chain me to the ground?

I stare at where the sail is no longer there.

It left a lifetime ago. Somewhere by

 

That unforgiveable line –

 

Of Sea and Sky

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Young persons' section - Third prize

Remember Me When You Are Famous by Emily Oldham, Wolverhampton

 

When you’re a multi-millionaire

Play concerts in Trafalgar Square

Drive a limo everywhere

Remember.

 

When writers queue outside your door

Everyone’s begging you for more

You’re off on yet another tour

Remember.

 

When you need a bodyguard

And writing tunes is getting hard

And you’re not sure who your friends are

Remember.

 

I’ll always be here for you, that’s for sure

And I’ll never, ever ask for more,

I’m not perfect- who is anyway?

But I’ll see you through your rainy days.

 

When life seems too good to be true,

Everyone shares your point of view,

Giggling girls encircle you

Remember.

 

When your dreams are reality

But you don’t feel completely free

You’ve seen everything you want to see

Remember.

 

When sometimes concerts get you down

And you can’t call your life your own

You just want to be left alone

Remember.

 

I don’t ask much, I wouldn’t dare,

But when you’re feeling worse for wear

Please, don’t let fortune stand between us-

Remember me when you are famous.

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Children's section - First prize

Witches in Brown Coats by Hugo Grundy, West Yorkshire

 

In the carpark

of the LeClerke supermarché

are lying pieces of the bark of trees

made of fur.

They look like wood

but if you hold them

in your hand

they are softer than

the softest furry animal.

 

They are clumps

dropped from witches coats.

LeClerke must be

a helper

of witches.

It is a witchy name.

 

Lots of old people

might not be able to leave

that town

but live happily there

listening to the bell

of an old church.

 

A witch at the top

of the tower

rings a dozen bells –

that’s another word for twelve –

wearing an all brown coat

with brown fur hat and gloves,

brown shoes, not curved,

but square shaped

sensible shoes.

The bells give information

from a witch

that something’s going to happen

like a tsunami

in another country.

 

In the castle of Saumur –

an underneath room

with old, dusty, smooth,

damp furniture –

brown, sensible furniture –

was where the witches lived.

not today – in the old days –

and maybe even tomorrow.

And a well

full of witches bones –

one of the traditions

to throw them down a well

and lock it up.

 

A church down

a thin street

says ‘unsafe’.

There is a secret room

At the top of the tower

for years and years

for witches to scare people

when they come at night

to pray.

Pockets in their brown coats

to carry their tricks

to play on people

and a crispy leaf.

On the outside wall, a tiny slip hole

to pour a glass of water through

and they could suck it up

with their flakey lips.

 

You might want to run.

The scene is changing

like changing weather

from sunny to stormy days.

France is full

of witches.

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Children's section - Second prize

Ohglysten by Rachel Price, Herefordshire

 

Over on the other side people are,

Holding diamonds in the air,

Girls are playing,

Lily pads are floating.

You will be sleeping as the,

Stars are flashing,

Time is racing as the,

End of the world is coming and there will be,

No more roses blooming.

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Children's section - Third prize

Death by Viola by Aimee Lauren Hilly Hughes, Birmingham

 

I don’t know how the murderer did it

All I know is the other guys dead

I think it could easily have been done

With one hefty blow to the head.

 

An easy way to do the deed

Would be to strangle him with a string

But one thing that I know for sure is that

His life didn’t simply sprout wings.

 

So lets gather up information

See what I know of the fiend

Well he has easy access to a viola

And he is excessively mean!

Spades, rakes, forks,
shiny like diamonds,
stuck in the earth,
mirroring each other.

Through the slack-black gate –
the stench of crispy, crumpled nasturtiums
tumbling over
washed by wind.

 

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2010 winners

Category A (Adult section)
1st prize - Maitreyabandhu
2nd prize - Edward Barker
3rd Prize - Roy Marshall

Category Y (12-17)
1st Prize - Jasmine Mueller-Hsia
2nd Prize - Ella Zhelong Mi
3rd Prize - Emily Oldham

Category C (11 & under)
1st Prize - Hugo Grundy
2nd Prize - Rachel Price
3rd Prize - Aimee Lauren Hilly Hughes

Commended in Category A
Carole Bromley for 'Crossing'
Frank Hooley for 'Collateral Damage'
Julia Deakin for 'Play
Declan O'Reilly for 'The Nobleness of Life'
Mary King for 'On the Right Hand of God'
C.J. Driver for
'In the Water- Margins'

Commended in Category Y
Maggie Tate for 'November'
Pauline Suwanban for 'Untitled'
Karensa Fitzwilliams for 'You'
Emily Oldham for 'Close the Curtain'

Commended in Category C
Elizabeth Tate for 'The Wild Boy'
Natahsa Wait for 'Why?'
Dualtogh Grundy for 'Museo di Archeologica, Naples'