2023 Open Poetry Competition Results

Judges Report:  Jessica Mookherjee - Author of Tigress (Nine Arches Press – shortlisted for Ledbury Munthe Prize 2021) and Notes from the Shipwreck (Nine Arches Press 2022) and Desire Lines (Broken Sleep Books 2023). Co-Editor of Against the Grain Press.

It is always a pleasure to judge poetry competitions because of the unexpected and varied nature of the poems that come to you. It is also an honour, because you are in the presence of people’s creations that have come out moving and rich experiences. It is also a very difficult and almost impossible task, because at one level – all art is subjective to taste. However when looking for the winning poems among all the worthy long list, I asked myself some fundamental questions. The first set of questions were about the difficult arena of craft and the last couple of questions were about emotion and impact. For a poet walks those lines between craft and art as well as performance.

I asked firstly; is this form working for this poem and this subject? There were many great poems sent in where the poem wasn’t fully living in the form the poet had given it. It’s always a good idea to ask if a particular form might help the subject matter. There were some poems where the form dominated the poem. There were many poems about fathers sent in and it made me think of Dylan Thomas’s Do Not Go Gentle poem, where he uses a villanelle to emphasise repetition and change. Poetry is often perfect vehicle for this and for saying the unsayable, fusing thoughts that just wouldn’t work in say, a song or a story. There were a few poems that were so moving, particularly about grief, poverty and stories of ancestors but just fell short of the shortlist because there needed a bit more movement in them. It is always good to ask ourselves why this form, why a poem and not a song or a short story? One of the highly commended poems Eating Curry Goat is a great example of how the form works for and with the poem, it doesn’t need to be formal to have form. Another is Strict and Immovable, where the collaged and fragmented nature of the form and word choices added so much weight to the subject matter.

Secondly I asked is this poem finished? – has it the best edit possible for it to fly into the world?  There were such beautiful poems sent in, ones of love, and I am pleased to say – many poems about politics and power. All of the poems I read had some excellent and stand out lines, however some poems could have been edited further to pull out that power. For one or two poems in the long list – I wanted just that bit more, for some a little less. It is important to write about the ills of the world and our anger in the midst of powerlessness. I want to commend all poets who wrote about injustice, politics, conflict and climate.

Thirdly I asked – is this poem surprising and unexpected? It is always with a sense of awe of the human psyche that I read a poem, bearing witness to a person’s weight of emotion in words. All of the long-listed poems were ones that needed to be written. It is when a poem makes me see something I have never seen, or shocks me or even pushes me beyond my first reaction that I return to the poem, over and over. It was great to read so many love poems, we need more love in the world most definitely, but how do we love?  The love described in the highly commended Sky of Los Feliz had me gripped.

Finally I asked myself does this poem make me cry, laugh, howl, or even wince. What does the poem do to me? Every poem in the long list had an impact on me and every poem on the short list made me want to return to the emotions and go deeper. From the poignant/funny of the love letter to Merthyr, with the fabulous tilt and lilt of the language and that all too familiar feeling of not quite being home to the fear and loathing of Putin and Me, all of these poems wove language and emotion together. There were so many great poems about the use of language and tongue. I thought I had found my winner early, but when I got to the eventual winner, I kept returning to We Dug a Hole over and over again – its sheer exuberance and confidence left me breathless. Well done to the poet, as they have shown what the English language can do and also said something to me about the confusing times we live in too- how we can be twisted and turned. The runner up, and by not much in it – was Gloria holds my hand en San Bernardino, how I fell in love with this poem, the arc and sweep and majesty of it and again, its mastery of language and the cinematic textures, I was with Gloria. I have often wondered what would happen if Philip Larkin meets Josephine Baker, I joke, I have never wondered this – but now after reading the poem I am thinking about the complexity of the nineteen twenties and Larkin’s poem ‘For Sydney Bechet’. I am also applauding all the poet’s bravery to tackle difficult subjects because it only when we start these debates do we get a good dialogue about race, poetry, language, performance, the world we find ourselves in, what is acceptable, who we are and our relationship to a bigger world. Well done to all poets on the list and well done to everyone who entered because you keep community poetry and the poets and yourself going and huge well done to the winner, as I am now just a little bit in love with you.

The total entry for the 2023 competition run by Black Eyes Publishing on behalf of the Gloucestershire Poetry Society was 568 poems.

(all entries were considered anonymously, throughout the process)

The Longlist consisted of 77 poems, all of which are eligible for the 2023 GPS Anthology. 

Final Short List: 

A Commuter Works at Home in the Village – Christopher Horton
and when the children vomited – Owen Gallagher
Dear Merthyr – Lisa Kelly
Dear Poetry, last night I dreamt I spoke with my father – Anna Saunders
Eating Goat Curry – Jenny Mitchell
Falling for the moon – Catherine Baker
Gloria hold my hand en San Bernardino – Linda Ravenswood
in alignment – Simon Alderwick
In the November Square, Kherson – Tess Biddington
Nightfall in Nairobi – Estelle Price
Philip Larkin meets Josephine Baker – Emma Conally-Barklem
Putin and Me – Paul Francis
Sky of loz Feliz – Linda Ravenswood
Spit it Out – Pauline May
Station to Station – Dominic James
Strict and Immovable – Alan Dunnett
Tea Songs – Joe Meredith
This – Scott Elder
Toadstool, Frog’s Umbrella – Isabella Mead
We dug a hole – Charlotte Stokes Meyer zu Natrup
Wimblebarrow – David Hale