By my count, there are now four potential competitions:

1. One in which each line is an anagram for the same poet:
Alarmed, later, we
ladle warmer tea
[Walter de la Mare]

2. One in which each line's an anagram for a different poet:
Hog my enchilada,
Tamale war elder
[Michael Donaghy and WdlM]

3 and 4 are either of the above, but with extraneous letters and words allowed in each line. Why say, "in which each line is an anagram" then? I admit, I'd like to be able to make a possessive out of Fleur Adcock's name, to permit elk fads occur, which could produce something really topical and incisive.

But has anyone noticed that the Spectator posted the instructions for its "Mixed Messages" competition on April 1st?

Finally, I'd like to broach the possibility that each line may contain one word from the anagram of the same or a different well known poet's name, each anagram to contain as many words as the poem has lines, except that extra words and/or lines will be permitted.

Frank

To which I say, FEELING THE HOT GROWTH.

(That is, FORGET THE WHOLE THING).

Well, I think this fulfils the requirements for the revised competition. It also addresses the problem Bill Greenwell mentioned about making the poem fit the title. It has the drawback of being libellous (though I am told you cannot libel the dead) and I particularly regret the calumny on Gavin Ewart, but I am sure his shade will forgive me. If anyone spots that any anagram is wrong, be a dear and point it out.

The Name

Shelley, hell yes, what a rude boy!
Hopkins gets to screw posh kin.
Auden wants to stroke a nude boy
Keats takes sex-crazed lodgers in.

Enright likes one nighter sport.
Shadwell (welsh lad) buggers boylets.
Porter is of bad report.
Eliot (T.S.) lurks in toilets.

Arnold rogers Landor’s daughter.
Rochester thinks her corset hot.
Ewart’s name was writ in water.

Shakespeare’s name was not.

Thanks for the help and the inspiration John, this is what I'm putting in;

The Name (hate men)

While Seamus Heaney, aha, eyes menu,
Lewis Carroll sees crawlies roll it,
Alfred Lord Byron forlornly badder, knew
it was he and TS Eliot stole it.

I'm sweaty Lily,moaned Willy Yeats, and what
a caloric dump!, Padraic Colum agreed,
Ay, a scrotal twister, said Sir Walter Scott,
we eat rubber bison said Robbie Burns, indeed.

As C.S. Caverly lets calves cry,
Charles Causley casually cheers
letting Sylvia Plath (a vital sylph) buy
dinner, Ogden, a hen’s gonad, Nash, leers.

“Timely vandals!” says Edna St V Millay,
then lechery yelps came from Percy Shelley.
Turn cartwheels Tom asked Charlotte Mews, OK?
When Romeo Moore, cried not on your nelly!

Great stuff Jim, particulary a hen's gonad. But, alas, the woman is Charlotte Mew, so you'll need to fix that.

Yipes!

Do a cartwheel Tom, begged Charlotte Mew, OK?

Should do it eh? Many thanks John.

BTW I've asked the adorable Lucy ( I can suck up too) which half of the competition Bill Greenwell entered and to put me in the other.

Didn't Bill Greenwell say he was in for the whole nine yards, the difficult bit. But of course he could do one of the others too. You can actually put in additional entries, under your own name or using a pseudonym. Maude Gracechurch, who used to win regularly, was actually a canal barge belonging (I think) to E.O. Parrott who won even more often.

I swore I wouldn't waste time on this.
I'm hopeless. :eek:


Emily Dickinson, iced, solemn, inky;
Robert Burns, why are your rubbers torn?
DH Lawrence, darn lech! We find you so kinky!
Dylan Thomas, sadly, a month now you mourn.
TS Eliot--ole Tits! Are you wearing a bra?
Reveillez-vous, Baudelaire! L'aube delira!

....................--Sari Hormone

But what about Hughes? He hugs.

Marion, no time could possibly have been wasted that produced Robert Burns rubber's torn. Just think. It was there all the time until you uncovered it but NOBODY KNEW IT. I suppose Lord Byron Lor! Dry nob! is simply rude.