"I put on my judge’s wig and cloak, sit and carefully read through the poems in the hope that I will come across ones I wish I had written. This year, the standard was particularly high. (So high in fact, that none of the poems I had submitted anonymously made it through to the final). I jest, although not about the standard of entries, which made whittling down the final selection almost impossible. So many fine poems, so many difficult choices. But, as poets must write, so judges must judge, and having carried 10 poems around with me all week, any one of which was a worthy winner, I finally reached a verdict. My congratulations to the three winners, to the three commendations and to all the poets who entered this very special competition."
Roger McGough CBE
And the 2022 winners are:
1st Prize: Di Slaney
Judge's remarks: "In this field of dreams, the poet rolls the words back and forth across the page with all the love and care of a wordscape gardener."
History of a Field
Roll it back, roll it back, this greentipped scroll, this
loosetop layer, from how-it-is to how-it-used-to-be;
unplant the trees, dig up the hedge, blur out the track,
return the moat, the gate, the square of earth you see
behind the church, give sheep those other lives or
deaths, keep rolling till loose cattle stroll black
graveyards late at night, pigs begrudge their lack
of straw in tinlid huts, hayyield begets huge stacks
and roll, keep rolling while WW2 Italians pick fat
fruit from applepears and sing sweet songs and trick
young localhearts with tiny matchplanes crafted
under candles in the loft, keep rolling back past all
their prayers, soil shifting, harrowed, furrowed,
shires turning, bridled, harnessed, tacked; keep
rolling - now land is wider uphilldownhill, woodside,
broadside, trees reaching overunderround, leaves
smacking heads, rumpsandtumps, the forest’s knack
to spread and swallowwhole this little patch, its
shack of small dominion, its stamp, its hearth,
your heart. Stop rolling. Fold it back, fold it back.
2nd Prize: Alex Toms
Judge's remarks: "Agrophobia climbs out of the Dickensian darkness and into the light in this delicate graphic poem."
The Climbing Girl’s Wedding
I have no one to give me away.
The aisle is long. My husband-to-be
waits at the altar like the sun
I used to crane my neck towards.
I edge forwards. I, who have climbed and crawled
narrow passages since I was not much bigger
than a scuttle, have never made
such a heart-stopping journey.
I think how far I have come: from harlequin child
in a motley of soot smears and scabs,
to the woman dressed in lace fine as the first smoke tendrils
of a fire that’s slow to catch.
I was a climbing girl, could shimmy up a chimney
before my master could set a match to the grate,
feeling my way through the darkness and coffin closeness.
Elbows tucked, fear a coal in my stomach’s stove,
I knew the crushing weight of absences –
the absence of light, of air. A rush of cold
would make my heart leap like a flame:
then I’d turn my face to the small square of sky,
watch the blue suddenly darken with passing birds –
geese and swans overwintering. How I longed
to stretch my arms to their full span.
When I got too big to climb, I became a master sweep,
wheeling my barrow through the piss-washed streets –
a flower girl with bristly blooms, bestowing kisses
on passers by wishing for a black O of luck
to hold against their cheeks.
One man kept coming back for more. I blushed beneath
my rouge. The clipped wings of my lungs fluttered…
It is done. We stepped, blinking, into brightness.
The bells rang and the chimneys all around
threw a confetti of smuts.
Later, I lay a dust sheet on the bed.
His kisses were the feather softness of ash.
In the morning I looked where I had lain,
saw the imprint of a soot angel,
a black swan in flight.
3rd Prize: Bruce Harris
Judge's remarks: "The robot at the computer carefully crafts this Orwellian nightmare with poetic precision."
Morning Machine
Boot me up, the early train; return key, no room again;
open app on pinching seats and select a moment when;
log on to episode history; I’m going to be stuck with standing
no function seems available for controlling and commanding.
Click, we’re on the move now, all sat in rows like androids
programmed into papers with their pictures and their factoids;
advanced search on My Documents, the best of times I’ve known,
think up security software for the virus called alone.
Boot it up, the world is passing; Save Target As the view;
I’d put some in My Pictures if there was ever anything new.
Windows here and Windows there, the zipped up mundaneity
virtually a million miles from virtual reality.
Click, I search for images, I search for sights and sites,
physically through the endless days and virtually through nights;
the adult checks, the video streams, the movies by the minute,
all my life’s a download and I am never in it.
Sign off, the final station; direction, office cell;
the programme now responding is one I know too well.
We mouse along the platform, but this is no play station,
it’s auto format for each life until its termination.
Click, I’m at my desk now, an online working gnome,
staring at a small glass screen just like I do at home.
Customise the file of me dressed in my working suit;
Save As a day like yesterday and eternally reboot.
High Commendations
Mike Barlow - Nonesuch
Harry Bayman - The General Dabbles in Magic Realism
Emily Wills - Dissecting a Brain With You in '76