[Bruce McBirney]

"Lorenzo Lotto's Annunciation" is an especially fitting choice, Susan, since it was one of the bake-off sonnets here a few years back.

Nice to have you back, Catherine!

[Maryann Corbett]

Yes, welcome back, Catherine, and thanks for serving as our judge and guide!

This seems like a good time to say how much I've valued this short "milestones" essay at Umbrella, about your poem "Bete Noir." It's a reminder, one I should take more often, of the need to find not just any form but the right form for the material. Thanks for it as well!

[Catherine Tufariello]

Susan, thanks for that warm introduction and for all the work you've already done behind the scenes as host of the bake-off. And Bruce, Roger and Maryann, thank you very much for the warm welcome. As a past participant and a fan of many talented poets whose work has been featured in the bake-off over the years, I was honored when Alex asked me to comment on this year's crop. I look forward to posting the finalists and getting the ball rolling with my responses, and then to hearing what everyone else has to say. I'll give my personal top three at the end, but I see myself as more a conversation-starter than a judge.

While the poems Susan sent to me are very diverse in style, voice, subject and so forth, I noticed a few patterns. Perhaps the most intriguing of these was that firearms featured heavily in these sonnets. Some were literal and some figurative; some went off by line 14 and some did not (though Chekhov might have held that you should never have a gun appear in the octave that doesn't go off in the sestet). I hope that's enough of a teaser to whet your curiosity. I'll post the first two sonnets tomorrow.

[Tim Murphy]

Not firearms! Has Lance turned in another tour de force on squirrel hunting? Yekaterina, so good of you to adjudicate. When you're not busy with that, you might enjoy hitting "show all topics" and moseying back through the Bake-off Archives. Susan, what an excellent intro. Screening and hosting is a big job, and I'm very appreciative that you accepted Alex' invitation.

[R. S. Gwynn]

Catherine, didn't they tell you that this is an NRA-sponsored competition?