[John Whitworth]

Those who set them do sometimes have a go. And if the name is Bill Greenwell, they win!

[Jayne Osborn]

Ah, yes, of course.

When Graham asked the question, John, I was thinking in terms of 'them' being Lucy from The Spectator and Tessa Castro from The Oldie. For some reason, I can't imagine them writing poetry - but who knows? Perhaps they do.

I was forgetting that those who set the competitions are sometimes ordinary mortals.

[Brian Allgar]

Originally Posted by John Whitworth

Those who set them do sometimes have a go. And if the name is Bill Greenwell, they win!

... or Adair R Fyn.

But if the name is 'Brian Allgar', they don't win (sniff).

[Jerome Betts]

An expense of eyesight in a waste of time . . . but if anyone fails to detect the deep thematic coherence between S1 and S2 I''ll set the hounds of spring on them.


Where is the world we roved, Ned Bunn?
And Marion, cow-eyed,
The lovely Mary Morison
Wearing white for Easter-tide.

Between the acres of the rye
Below the gallows’ tree! -
In shards the sylvan vases lie,
At Abdon under Clee.


Herman Melville :To Ned
W.H. Auden: Song of the Master and Boatswain
R. Burns: Mary Morison
A.E. Housman: Loveliest of Trees SL II

W. Shakespeare: It Was A Lover and His Lass
Thomas Hood: The Last Man
Herman Melville: The Ravaged Villa
A.E. Housman: Fancy’s Knell LP XLI

[John Whitworth]

It's not the winning, Jerome. Jayne's going to do that. It's the taking part. Like the Olympics, don't you know.

[Brian Allgar]

Unfortunately, John, it's not quite like the Olympics, as I can't see any way of cheating.

[John Whitworth]

Poets don't cheat, Brian. Poets STEAL.

[Mary McLean]

Christmas with the In-Laws Up North

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets
generations have trod, have trod, have trod,
for a journey, and such a long journey.

We passed them, grinning and pomaded, girls
knock-kneed, coughing like hags. We cursed through sludge
where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies.

And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
Dear God! The very houses seem asleep.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
and eat three pounds of sausages at a go.

The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, Eliot / God’s Grandeur, Hopkins / Journey of the Magi, Eliot / Whitsun Weddings, Larkin / Dulce et Decorum Est, Owen / Ode to a Nightingale, Keats / Anthem for Doomed Youth, Owen / Upon Westminster Bridge, Wordsworth / Ulysses, Tennyson / Warning, Jenny Joseph.

[Jayne Osborn]

Nice one, Mary!

That looks effortlessly smooth - when we all know it's not an effortless exercise, by any means!

Jayne

[Mary McLean]

Thanks Jayne! I was pleased to wring some sort of sense out of it. I can't even imagine the effort of making it rhyme too like yours. I think I need to buy more anthologies.