Thank you to all who have entered competitions and attended this year. Much writing goodness heard and shared by all! We look forward to the stories, poems, essays and everything in between as the group heads towards 2024.
We return on Thursday 11th January at Parenting 2000 for 8pm. The first meeting of the year is usually a ‘kick start’ of activities to get the creative juices flowing. So, take out those new sparkly biros and jotters, dust off the type writer or fire up the laptop – time to get writing!
Thank you for inviting me to judge your present poetry competition and I was very happy to do so. It reminded me that I had been an adjudicator for Southport Poetry Competition in 2006 which seems a mighty long time ago. It is always an honour and quite humbling that people are willing to expose so much of their inner selves to a stranger, but for me, honoured and excited to see what lies within a shortlist. After an initial read I slowed to absorb words and phrases that took poems beyond the surface and how effective this was in each case.I was looking for originality in ideas, language, structure, use of metaphor, imagination, a poem that opens the mind or changes how we see things, a poem prepared to take risks. Peggy Poole, the well known North West poet said – “I know a poem when I see it,” and I feel at the least, a competition piece should be enough of a real poem to affect the mind, spirit and heart of the reader. There were many poems dealing with loss and sadness but there was uplift also. Some poems had a structure that didn’t quite work or needed a definite form, an awkward line or uneven rhythm and a poem should always be well presented on the page. Finally they were read out loud which acts as a litmus test, the importance of how the words sound in harmony. There were poems that nearly made the final sifting and it came down to their various strengths and how they moved me, so many did. Thank you to all who entered.
No 1 EACH MORNING NOTE
Gareth Culshaw
was drawn into this poem from first reading by the deceptive but beautiful language. Each reading intrigued me more with its many layers. The blackbird/ morning imagery made it mysterious and breathtaking: “ a morning that pours out of a blackbird.” “ I keep walking into the blackbird’s song.” A journey of the spiritual, the actual and with strong emotional layering it felt like love and death combined. I particularly liked how the last three lines didn’t try to explain but if anything, added to the intrigue. A wonderful achievement.
No2 Water Muscles
Denise Bennet
This is a heartwarming poem with a modern yet timeless theme and an effective blend of metaphor and literal interleaved. The water muscle/ resilience idea works well and is very moving.The satisfying last stanza feels exactly right. I loved the warmth and caring here.
No3. Night Bus
Doreen Hinchliffe
The poem invites us on a journey, cocoons us in the fug of the bus and draws the gaze out from present to past and back again. There is evocative language : “ the disused cinema is longing for the usherette’s torch,” “a haze of breath hovers” creating a sense of the real and surreal throughout. A use of sibilants adds to this.
HC. Industry and Genius
Patricia Leighton
A worthy poem with outstandingly strong lineation beautifully presented.
C WANING
HAZEL TEARE
A strongly written poem with a clear message about climate change and a clever use of language/ metaphor.
C. The Girl Who Shares My Name
Doreen Hinchliffe
This poem drew me back to it many times and had an unsettling narrative and intriguing build throughout to its climax.It uses good descriptive language, a strong sense of mystery. and felt chilling in parts.
H. ANOTHER ANCIENT MARINER
Alec Taylor
The Humour Prize is a Villenelle which concerned the great moment of meeting our heroes or hero and spending time in their company, in this case our local poet Roger McGough. What was impressive was the rhyming coupled with sustaining the humour and managing to find full rhymes for “celebration “ throughout. Well done!
John Maguire is a writer, playwright, historic walking-tours operator, community activist and Creative Director of ArtsGroupie CIC.
ArtsGroupie aims to make the arts accessible to all. Developing theatre productions, heritage walk tours and creative workshops taking them out to communities in the Northwest. CIC ArtsGroupie’s website https://www.artsgroupie.org/
John has had nine of his plays staged professionally, including KITTY: Queen of the Washhouse, a play that revisited the life of public washhouse pioneer Katherine Wilkinson. Two of his plays opened the Sir Ken Dodd Performance Gardens at Shakespeare North Playhouse in July 2022. The Kitty Wilkinson play about community cohesion and activism sold out St Georges Hall for the sixth time in October 2022 and went on a mini tour in March 2023 to celebrate International Women’s Day, playing Manchester, Liverpool and for three nights at the Kings Head theatre, Islington, London. It has recently played to sell out audiences at the Cockpit Theatre in Shakespeare North and has been performed a total of 28 times. It is set to return in 2024 with plans to take it to Ireland.
He has written over 135 articles for online international magazine Ten Million Hardbacks and two children’s books, Sophie and the Spider and The Liver Bird. (Recently adapted into an interactive outdoor theatre experience for parks).
He project managed the Liverpool’s 2021 Year of Writing with Writing on the Wall 2021-2022, running diverse writing events, workshops, activities across Liverpool and co-ordinating a writing bus tour to low- socio economic areas. There were also commissions and various competitions, for all ages and abilities. A full report can be found here:
The creative content throughout the year was also digitally compiled and displayed on arts partners websites and social media platforms using the tag #LiverpoolWrites
John is currently the History Group research lead, working with the Liverpool Irish Festival two days a week on a five year programme to develop assets around the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail. The first year culminated in October 2022 with the publication of a book, REVIVE and a presentation ‘A Research Relay’ by the volunteer team about their work at National Museums, Liverpool.
John is a facilitator with a strong track record of creative engagement and experience in socially engaged practices. He has fifteen years’ experience of facilitating writing workshops in schools and in communities.
As a white Irish, LGBT+, working class, neuro-divergent writer, from a low-socio economic background John has worked hard to establish himself in the arts overcoming many barriers.
Full Rules: Please Read Carefully
Your entry should be an unpublished, original story on any theme of up to 2000 words. A story has been previously published if it has been on an internet site or in an independent publication.
Do not put your name or any other identifying information on your story (including in headers/footers). It must have a suitable title, which should be both appropriate and interesting.
There is no set theme or style for the competition.
Entries in English,please (dialect is allowed).
You DO NOT need an entry form. Send us a separate cover sheet with each story’s title and word count. You MUST include your name, postal address, telephone number and e-mail address. If you don’t, we can’t let you know if you have won a prize.
For internet entries: Put the above cover sheet details in the body of the email. Include PayPal ref. number OR put the names of all entered stories in the Comments box on PayPal when paying.
Please use basic formatting in your files. Any sidebars, headers, footers, inset images, illegible fonts or unusual layouts may result in your electronic entry being rejected.
Submissions should be in any of .doc, .docx, rich text or .odf file types ONLY when attaching your entry file(s) to the email. Please do not use .pages or .pdf files unless you have no other alternative.
No individual correspondence will be entered into regarding receipt of works/payments. Please do not send any material to confirm delivery, or use Recorded Delivery. Please ensure you attach correct postage and use correct stamps (see Royal Mail information https://www.royalmail.com/sending/barcoded-stamps). Southport Writers’ Circle will not be able to retrieve mail held at the Sorting Office for want of correct postage.
Once your entry has been submitted, any entrant contacting the judges for any reason that is deemed to be an attempt to circumvent the judging process is likely to be disqualified.
If entering by post, please include an SAE if you wish to receive a print of the results/judges report (if available) when the competition is finished. For email entries, please note clearly in the body of the email “I would like to receive a copy of the results”
Winners will be informed in Dec 2023/ Jan 2024, results will be published on this site thereafter. There may be a delay publishing results and/or winning stories depending on circumstances and permissions. We will have an Awards Evening where winning entries are read out, and successful writers will be invited to join (and can attend virtually if desired).
Winning stories may be published on this site for 12 months with permission of original author(s).
The organiser’s decision is final.
Optional – Paper saving single-spaced entries encouraged.
The fee is £3 for each story, or £10 for 4
(electronic entries have an additional processing fee.). Postal entries must be accompanied by cheque or postal order for the correct amount, made out to Southport Writers’ Circle.
