RESULTS OF JUNE POETRY COMPETITION

 

In this competition themed Anniversary, 1887 by Catrin Mascall soon rose to the top and remained there so I’ve no hesitation in declaring that this poem is the winner.

 

 

A beautiful, bright day to hide one’s woe

Surrounded by smiles, I forge my own

For our unclouded happiness blackened long ago

 

My eyes threaten to betray me, to overflow

The landau arrives, the horses draped in finery

A beautiful, bright day to hide one’s woe

 

Through streets the public cheer, row after row

Their joy permeates, stretches the length of London

For our unclouded happiness blackened long ago

 

A sunbeam falls, golden rays suffuse; I glow

As your Te Deum dances through the Abbey

A beautiful, bright day to hide one’s woe

 

The celebrations stir my heart, but even so

I long for solitude, the dark, and cool cotton

For our unclouded happiness blackened long ago

 

At last! Alone, abed, to dream I know

Of your smile, indelibly impressed on my soul.

A beautiful, bright day to hide one’s woe

For our unclouded happiness blackened long ago..

 

Catrin Mascall

 

 

This is about Victoria's reflections on her Golden Jubilee celebrations.  It captures the dilemma of Victoria being torn between happiness and the sadness of losing Albert.  It has the form of a villanelle but does not obey its dictates, just as Victoria is not going along with the celebrations.  We have crisp pentameters for celebration and long hexameters to echo Victoria's sadness.  The rhymes are not in accord with those of a standard villanelle; instead there is an attempt to obey the rules, just as Victoria ‘forges’ a smile, but then the rhyme becomes mixed and significantly, in the last stanza, ‘soul’ has nothing rhyming with it, for Victoria herself is a lost soul.  The poem achieves what it has set out to achieve.

 

Less easy to choose but in the end definitely second is Divorces With Foxgloves by Christian Ward, despite the word ‘windows’ in the final line which jarred and I thought inappropriate.  The rest is charming, particularly ‘the blossoms turning the London pavements into wedding dresses of white lace’.  Fallen petals are poignant.  They are sometimes used to represent tears.  I once used them myself as ‘yesterday’s confetti’ when describing my terminally ill husband as ‘my dying bridegroom’.  This is not, however, a purely subjective choice based on this line alone, I promise you.  The rest is very moving, evocative and musical.

 

 

 

The foxgloves always remember

the anniversary of my divorce –

every June 3rd – popping up like calendar

notes every spring. The klaxon flowers

announce the date to the bumblebees

entering their dens, to the sky

with hues of jewels, to the blossoms

turning the London pavements

into wedding dresses of white and lace.

Look how proud they are to act

as unwanted messengers while I console

myself among the meadows

closing their windows as spring winds down.

 

Christian Ward

 

 

There was another poem submitted which would have come second had it been on subject!  This was quite simply not remotely about an anniversary.  Writing off-subject was done by twelve other poets.

 

This is one of several ways of disqualifying your poem in a competition.  A few were more than twenty lines long.  What a pity.  They were automatically ruled out, I’m afraid.  Other errors I would have overlooked had the poem been very good, though I think some judges would not have been so merciful.  These include incorrect grammar, spelling or in one case in this competition, the spelling of a word in two different ways.  The word was ‘ageing / aging’.  Never mind that both spellings are allowed, one should be consistent.  None of these would have put me off though, had the poem been otherwise worthy, nor poor punctuation.  In fact few people can punctuate.  Poems arriving after the closing date should be avoided.  Happily this time no gems were among the late arrivals.

 

My subject Anniversary was, I think, less widely interpretable than some I could have set and so most were anniversaries of wedding days or the days lovers met: some happy, some sad, some disenchanted, disappointed.

 

I always feel humbled and privileged to be trusted with the generously self-exposing thoughts of other poets and I thank you all.