Reflections on the 2021 KES Poetry Competition

World Book Week is a great time to celebrate the wealth of writing talent right here in KES. The past year has shown that KES creativity and imagination cannot be ‘locked down’ and we’ve seen a proliferation of writing across the School.  We now have nearly 70 members of our weekly ‘virtual’ Creative Writing Society ranging from year 7 to Year 13, we have seen KES students winning national and international writing competitions, and this year we had so many entries for the Poetry Competition that Mrs Bruton had to create a new category! 

The theme for this year’s competition was ‘Reflections’ and pupils interpreted the concept with their usual abundance of creativity, imagination and flair. There were poems on body image, poems about doppelgangers, poems about Narcissus. There were poems reflecting on the past, present and future; poems about magic mirrors, black mirrors and cracked mirrors; verse depicting ghostly reflections and reflections from outer space. Our judge Rachel Heath, the critically acclaimed author of literary fiction including the Costa shortlisted ‘The Finest Type of English Womanhood’ and the haunting ‘Part of the Spell’, was incredibly impressed by the amazing standard of writing.

‘This was a very difficult task!’ Rachel observed. ‘And I bet every year the judge says this, and everyone thinks they’re just being polite and encouraging, but let me tell you I’m not that polite, and it was VERY hard!’

Our judge went on to observe: ‘There was such a terrific range of subjects brimming with ideas, images and feelings: poems which spoke to and wrestled with our strange Corona lives, with American politics and with the urgency of the environmental crisis. We all need writers to find ways to express our experiences for us when we sometimes cannot; and I loved the alert responsiveness of each of these entries. Poetry too can speak of worlds just beyond us, or what might be or was and which exist in our imaginations and I really cherished the poems which took flight into new places and things. Well done to every single one of you for being brave and generous enough to share your work; it really was a pleasure to read. 

The results are below and all prizewinning entries will be published in the 2021 edition of ‘Anthology’ along with the winners of our annual Short Story Competition, later this year.

Junior Year 7/8 Category

Highly commended

Stuck in the Cell by Eloise Szanto

Lovely, lively rhythm here and a very good summary of our year! The repetition of ‘carried on’ works well grounding both the events of the poem and the reader’s experience. I liked the way this then comes together with a nod to the universal experience in the last verse. Well done.

An Icy Reflection by Lydia Fearon

A super sense of icy stillness and simplicity here which was extremely effective and very moving. I liked the use of blue and yellow to suggest moods and seasons; a case of less doing a very good job of being more! The poem skilfully conveys a frozen atmosphere and a feeling of wintry fear. 

Reflections by Freddie Champniss

I liked this poem’s choppy narrative voice; the careful casualness of the line ‘her other acts, the stress with the cops’ was excellent and ‘My Ma’s not a bad woman/just bitter with emotions’ showed lovely emotional understanding. I liked the repetition at the end of each verse, until the final verse when the memories of a difficult year are no longer to be caught in the rear view mirror but reflected in his eyes - exactly how our memories become our experience. Great stuff!

Runners up

Reflections by Sarah Blacker
A chilling poem which makes brilliant use of varied line lengths and snippets of dialogue to gradually build to a shocking climax. Simple, stark language punctuated with that one luminous image and then a chilling final twist. So effective!

Reflections on Our Game by Elijah Fraser
A very original and interesting idea with a super use of language which successfully evokes the ordered regularity of chess and the anticipation of the game ahead -  and then the narrators slow attritional movement towards doubt and defeat. I felt every strategic move, and really enjoyed the careful deployment of chess terms in this poem too. Very well done.

Winner
Reflections by Indira Pandit
A very sophisticated poem which showed an excellent and elegant control and command of language, form and subject. The sounds of ‘leaves’ and ‘breeze’ ‘tree’ ‘free’ created a wonderful sense of flowing air and movement. I loved the idea of this ‘ballet for the sky’ being ‘the perfect lie’, and the rhetorical question in the last line lands beautifully. Very impressive!  You can read Indira's poem in full below.

Reflections 
 
The upended lines of the tree 
Mimic those same lines of the one that is free 
Forever copying that branch, those leaves 
Forever imitating that sway in the breeze 
It's merely a ballet for the sky 
The lake has created this lie 
But when the rain comes, it shatters the lake’s façade 
Gone are the trees which once starred 
Not that the sky notices through its dismay 
And when the sun returns so does the play 
There is not one imperfection 
But how could there be? After all, it’s just a reflection.

INTERMEDIATE Year 9/10 Category

Highly Commended

Waiting  by Hannah Blacker
It isn’t easy to make a state of stasis interesting but this poem subtly dramatises each situation with great flair, and with a lovely eye for the telling detail; ‘his son in his arms’, ‘her pigtails escaping’ and ‘rucksack heavy on his shoulders/Books full of words he didn’t understand.
There’s a wonderful sense of narrative sweep as the poem zooms in on different states of waiting, leaving the reader knowing just the right amount about each situation but wanting to know more. Having lots of human moments held within the poem by nature in the first and final stanzas created a stimulating context, and the mentioning of poppy heads and harsh landscapes created subtle and interesting notions of time and history. Terrific!

The Golden Lampshade by Ellie Martin
A really intriguing and imaginative poem; I read this over and over! It has terrific confidence and the pressing repetition and arresting strangeness of the line ‘a rabbit can only ever be a rabbit once’ gathers and draws the reader’s attention and imagination very effectively. Loved, and was impressed by, the strange environment of this poem - the ‘hissing meadow’ and ‘the rippling murky skyscrapers of weeds’. Excellent.

Striped Shapes in the Night by Jeremy Hewett
A fantastically evocative and vibrant poem. Full of beautiful language, and a real sense of lurking archaic mystery. The poem’s movement from chaos of fire to the creep of the thylacine was expertly done, and I was excited by all the poem’s elements: the howling fires and the clear pools. It captured that shadowy sense of barely seen and hardly known very well. Atmospheric and sophisticated.

Reflections by Isla Byrne
Was very moved by the lonely, gentle atmosphere of this poem and the use of light/outside and dark/inside together with the littering of the empty street with a covid mask and a stray cat. The narrator’s journey down the pavement from critical judgement to fuller understanding and recognition was very judiciously and delicately done. 

Runners up

Monstrous Reflection by Maddy Bobin
A very powerful and impressive poem. The rhyme scheme works extremely well here with the sounds and rhythm of language building a real sense of threat and strangeness. There’s a magnetic sense of instinct and wildness in this poem - and the last verse really delivers! It reminded me of the stories by Angela Carter - the folkloric mix of animal and woman. I was impressed by your thematic ambition and how skilfully you succeeded in also holding the form.

Medusa, Here You Are by Anna W
Adored this. A striking and intelligent poem with a well-metered, shrewd understanding of injustice. It was a pleasure to read.  Very impressed by your excellent use of questions to direct the reader to re-think their inherited assumptions about Medusa, and your whip-smart use of the conceit of a stage with starring actors and an audience. Thought-provoking, witty and arresting without ever being didactic. Lovely stuff - well done!  

Winner

July Eulogy by Elise Withey
A gorgeous thrumming poem. Just gorgeous. I loved the sublime mix-up of sensual, physical immediacy and nostalgia, and how this gives way to the violence of the wrong story. The structure and form really works, and you do feel reading it you are taking a footstep with each verse across some concerning gaps in the boardwalk. The poem sings because of your poetic precision and brilliantly captures a heady sense of seaside tackiness and yearning. There’s not a word out of place - the interlude was well won and timed. I enjoyed the details of the plastic chairs too hot to sit on and the marvellous incongruity of the snow-globe from the gift shop. This is an incredibly impressive and skilful poem, full of imagination, depth and moment. I loved reading it - thank you.  Read Elise's poem in full below.

July Eulogy

Tell me the story
where the boardwalk tapers off into the horizon.

Sizzling oil. A pocket full of change. 
A slice of summer wrapped up in
greasy newspaper so the ink stains your fingers.
The waves pummel plum bruises into the sky
and your mouth is sweet from the waffles
and your nose is peeling because you forgot suncream again.
I chase you across the car park
leaving wet footprints over the sun-warmed asphalt,
and you’re laughing, and I’m laughing.
Do I catch you? I’ve forgotten. I hope not.

Plastic chairs, too hot to sit on. Ice cream dripping through wooden slats. This is
an interlude. This is an apology. This is where
you remember to breathe.

I lean in to kiss you but

that’s the wrong story. In this there’s a fist where your mouth should be.
Teeth, knuckles, hearts,
the cheap snowglobe you bought from the giftshop—
you’re good at breaking things, darling.

Tell me the story
where we walk until the pier falls away beneath us
and step off into the sea, 
bubbles like shooting stars. 

What did you wish for?
                                        Not this.

Maybe another story. Maybe another summer. Here,
the sky fades. The boardwalk ends.

SENIOR Year 11/12/13 Category

Highly Commended

Everything has Gravity by Sam Bevis
This poem made me smile! I loved the repetition, and its enjoyable, bold directness.The final bounce of words having gravity too was terrific. 

Sepia Toned Memories by Isobel Smith
A very immersive poem with a powerful sense of heaviness, dust and age. A skilful use of language; I really felt overwhelmed by ‘yellowing light’ and the sense of being ‘surrounded by things hidden’. A clever conjuring of claustrophobia, and I celebrated the narrator’s rejection of those memories at the end!

A New Dawn? Josh Bernard Ross
A smart and timely poem - I really liked the sense here of upheaval, undercurrent and threat. Clever use of movement and disturbance with the crowd as a wave against the Capitol. I liked the wary note of caution over hope too, and the knowledge that this is not some ‘surface cut’. Great!

Runners up

The Willow Trees by Sam Shepherd
I was very impressed by the perfect weighting and exquisite balance of each word, line and verse here. The whole poem has a really creditable sense of control, intelligence and poise which sits very well beside the philosophical nature of the poem.  I was immediately and happily sunk by the first three words: ‘Waking willows watch’ - lovely, lovely, stuff. Well done!

Masquerade by Olivia Laughton
A very rich and evocative poem, with a superb sense of grandeur and decay - much like Venice itself. You deftly capture a sense of the transience of culture and play; and I adored the lines ‘pulled under/by an emulous, meridian moon’. Also it was clever to include the reader in the last few lines too - urging them towards a sense of responsibility.

Winner

The Sun Will Come Out Again by Tess Xiao
This is a really super poem suffused with light and gold which captures all our experiences of being trapped indoors with only our memories. All done with a refreshing calmness and subtlety. I liked how the poem starts with the screen going blank, and then the relief followed by memory, loss, and the sunlight and festive lights flooding the verses over a year,  until the screen starts up its artificial light again in the final stanza. It’s very clever - and really works. I loved how you rhymed the final two lines which created an ending sense of harmony, and I relished all the delicate, domestic details in the poem. This poem is a wonderful and deeply humane response to our problematic times - many congratulations, and thank you for writing it.

Tess Xiao was also judged the overall winner of this year’s Poetry Competition.  Many congratulations Tess!

The Sun Will Come Out Again

The screen goes blank.
An unconscious sigh of relief as you finish
That last sip of coffee and glance 
At the piles of paper strewn across the desk. 
The sunlight softly filters through as you reminisce 
When you last felt that warmth on your face.

Golden streaks paint the sky 
Whisps of pink dance across the stage of blue.
No polaroid could capture the nostalgia 
Of contagious laughter and the talks of “remember when”.
Who knew that soon you would miss that feeling 
Of living in memories with a bittersweet smile on your face…  

The sunlight blankets the floor, 
Like Midas’ touch on your lazy cockapoo 
As she snoozes dreamily of chasing the clouds. 

Golden streaks paint the floor 
As you walk closely together amongst the beautifully flourished trees.
No poet could capture the romance 
Of holding hands to the subsequently syncing footsteps. 
Who knew that soon you would miss that feeling 
Of reassurance from their soft embraces…

The sunlight invades the walls, 
Like a shy disco ball bursting into blossoms of purple confetti
As you enter a magic shop called hope.

Golden streaks paint the walls
The glimmers of festivity mischievously bouncing off of them. 
No carol could capture the prosperity 
Of cosily gathering around that fulfilled Christmas tree.
Who knew that soon you would miss that feeling
Of being around those dearest to you without fear…

The sunlight slowly fades, 
Like saying a slow and meaningful adieu without reason 
As you gaze tearfully at the treasure of locked love. 

The screen starts up.
You feel like you’re going in circles as you watch 
That same old news headline drumming
On your slightly yearning heart. But don’t worry,
The sun will come out again. And it’ll filter through. 
You won’t have to reminisce about the past. 
At least, not while you’re busy making memories to last.