[Michael Cantor]

The Light Verse Bake-off voting is now open. We'll keep it open for two days, until midnight, Tuesday, September 21, Eastern Standard Time.

Please designate your first, second and third place choices in this thread, and we'll award the usual three points for first, two for second, one for first. If you name ties we will split the points for that and the next lowest rank. In the case of a total voting tie, the poem with the most first place votes (or second place, if firsts are tied) wins.

Once we have a popular vote winner, Deborah will announce her three choices, and I will then identify the finalists.

Meanwhile, feel free to continue commenting.

[Andrew Frisardi]

1. Barbie
2. Bears
3. Sheep

Thanks, Michael and Deborah, for all your work on this.

[Philip Quinlan]

1) No. 8 - Ageing
2) No. 2 - Death
3) Can't think of a 3.

Yes, thanks to Michael and Deborah.

As to the chosen poems, though, in the main they were not what I was expecting/hoping for. As usual, one wonders what one missed among those that didn't make the cut?

Philip

[John Beaton]

1. Barbie

I see it as quite a bit in front and I find it difficult to rank the rest because they are so neck and neck, so I'm casting only one vote.

Although I haven't engaged in them, I've enjoyed reading the discussions. I'm glad they have been frank. Workshopping is one thing, but I think it's also useful for poets to get honest feedback on how finished poems strut their stuff in the outside world. Written publication generally lacks the test of feedback that live perfomance gives, so I count frank feedback here as a good thing.

A big thank-you to you, Mike and Deborah, for taking on this difficult task. Humour is such a matter of taste that no judge can hope to please everyone. Here we've had two excellent poets pore over large numbers of poems, go through the painstaking task of selecting successive short-lists, and present them to us with commentary. That's a lot of skilled labour. Thank you for it.

John

[Steve Mangan]

1st ~ #7 : Sheep
2nd ~ #6 : Car

Quite a few neck and neck going for third, in the end I went for:

3rd ~ #9 : Fat

Thank you very much Michael & Deborah

[Cally Conan-Davies]

1. Star (cos for me, like Venus, it shines first)

2. Bears (cos it's funny)

3. Fat (cos I love food - it really could have been any other entry)

Apologies, like John, for inability to comment each day. Enjoyed the discussions, nonetheless, and thank finalists and commentators.

And Michael and Deborah.

Cally

[Janice D. Soderling]

1. Sheep
2. Bears
3. Barbie

But really I might have rearranged that list if I'd had my breakfast coffee. All three have special merits. And I could have named titles for honorable mentions. Thanks to all the poets for taking part.

Huge thanks to Mike and Deborah for devoting time and energy to this event. I think I discern a thought behind the selections that allows us to think especially hard on parody as a source of light verse.

[Petra Norr]

.
1. Ageing
2. Barbie
3. Bears

Thank you, Michael, for hosting the Bake-off.
Thanks so much, Deborah, for judging, and for your fine comments which came from the heart as well as the mind -- a nice combination.
.

[Catherine Chandler]

1. Star
2. Bears
3. Sheep


Thanks to Michael and Deborah for their work in collecting, selecting and commenting.

[Maryann Corbett]

1. Sheep
2. Bears (it's hard for me to one of these before the other)
3. Ageing (more a personal favorite, I guess)

Thanks, indeed, to Michael and Deborah.