Tag: poetry competitions

windy days

It’s been terribly blustery this weekend – the type of weather that tends to blow all ideas out of my mind and prevents me from focusing. It does, however, provide a good excuse to post a picture I took last spring of a wind flower – a wood anemone.

wind flower; wood anemone
It’s also an excuse to post a poem that seems to be new to the blog, although I think it was written back in 2002.
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past, present, future

war memorial

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permission granted

pink poppy
I had an email early this week asking for permission to include three of my limericks in an English school workbook, which is to be published in September ready for the new academic year. This wasn’t really a surprise as I’d agreed with the author back in February that she could use them. Even so, I had half forgotten our conversation and wasn’t sure when the book was due out or when I might hear.
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summing up

Recently I don’t manage to update the blog as often as I would like, although I do try to write at least one post a week. The problem is, of course, that I am doing many other things as well.

Bees on white foxglove spire
it's not just the bees who are busy
Perhaps this excuse would sound more believable if I did a round up of a few of my more recent writing achievements and activities. So, in no particular order:
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versification on a theme

The theme for this year’s National Poetry Day in the UK is stars. In conjunction with this, the Poetry Society ran a competition with the theme stripes for Stanza members.

coloured stripes

I often wonder how judges can hope to choose ‘the best’ of a competition’s entries when all the poems are different styles and topics, so I definitely like competitions that either suggest a theme or demand a specific poetic form, as I feel there is then at least one identifiable point of comparison.
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more mythical beasts

After the apparent popularity of the two splendid beasts in my previous post, I looked through my files to see if I had any more.

unicorn statue

Not only is this an impressive animal, but I’ve even found a poem that mentions unicorns to post with it. I am shocked, though, to realise that I wrote it nine years ago and I have done nothing with it.
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deadlines

converging railway tracks

Once again, there’s an email in my inbox telling me that the deadline for a poetry competition I have entered has been extended. Organisers usually do this when they haven’t had enough entries; this time, they say it’s ‘by popular request.’

Since I made a concerted effort to send off my entry at 10:30 pm on New Year’s Eve – the deadline was midnight – I am a little bit peeved. I could have had another drink instead of remaining sober enough to negotiate yet another illogical on-line payment and submission system.
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