ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

Hi Everyone
Thank you to all who entered this competition. The numbers were down a bit this year, but I was late getting the details out - so we will get them out earlier next year.
Please find below the results of the competition, and the judges report.

Boyup Brook Written Poetry Results

Open
1st No. 5… As Shadows Fall – Brenda Joy. Charters Towers Qld

H/C No. 38… Bluey – Tom McIlveen. Port Macquarie. NSW
H/C No. 9… A Message From Clancy – Shelley Hansen. Maryborough QLD
H/C No. 8… Homeless - Shelley Hansen

C No. 24… The Trench – Chris Taylor. Bunbury WA


Emerging Poet

1st No. 18… The Flower Thief – Jim Brigginshaw. Alstonville. NSW
C No. 32… Wot Are Them Signs For Dad? John Dooley. Toowoomba Qld


Congratulations to all winners/placegetters.
Irene



Boyup Brook Written Poetry Competition
Judges Report

I had the pleasure of judging this year’s written competition
In total there were 42 entries 26 open and 16 novice entries

OPEN
The Open Section of the competition was very close, with a number of poems vying for the few awards available. Many of those who missed out here shouldn’t be deterred as I’m sure they will come into contention in future competitions.
As mentioned, there was very little even between the winning poems, it more or less came down to my own personal choice; another judge may well have selected different poems.

On the down side small mistakes with meter in particular, spoilt several otherwise very good poems. It is worth noting that the winning poems were very well written, and aspiring poets would do well to study the winning poem on the ABPA website if it’s posted, this will give you an idea of the Standard that needs to be reached these days to really compete with the top writers.

EMERGING POET
It was pleasing to see the increased number of Emerging Poet’s entering the written competition this year. It was also pleasing to see that many of these poems showed promise and were a pleasure to read. While problems with meter was a common occurrence in most of these poems, writers should not be deterred. You will learn to master this difficult part of writing Bush Poetry in time – if possible I would suggest seeking advice from an experienced writer.

Judge
Terry Piggott

Thank you so much for publishing these results Irene. As I am still doing the Promotions, I have sent the results around to all the other communication outlets. Terry, I am so very lucky it seems that my poem struck a chord in a tight contest. Thank you Irene for organising the competition and Terry for your work in judging it.
Congratulations to Tom, Shelley (2 in the top 4 well done) and Chris and to the emerging writers -- great to hear that the latter section had some promising entries.
Brenda

Hearty congratulations, Brenda Joy, and likewise all the place-getters.

I’m thrilled that both of my entries received recognition, so thank you so much Terry, for judging them worthy of placings. Thanks also to Irene and all those involved in the organising.

This competition has an interesting, and for me, challenging aspect ... the 40 line limit. I don’t generally find it easy to tell a convincing narrative in so short a poem, so my entries for this competition are usually more in the descriptive vein. It also means I customarily have to write new works, as I don’t have a store of suitable short poems to draw on.

But ... kudos again to Maureen and her tireless prompts, because both of my entries this year started out life as homework in the writing workshop, later expanded and embellished until I felt they were competition material. Would they have been written without your prompts, Maureen? Not likely. So again, many many thanks!

Cheers
Shelley

Thank you for your thoughts re 40 line limit in this competition, Shelley. Well done in adapting to this restriction. I have discussed this issue with Irene and I think that shorter poems have a place in competitions as well and we will continue with this style for the Boyup Brook Comp. We have much opportunity to read lovely long narratives which cover a range of topics but the short punchy descriptive ones are just as useful, particularly in using for performance events. Let's encompass all poets in our competitions. Next year we hope Irene will be entering!!!!?? Meg Gordon

Congratulations to all! A 40-line limit is still pretty generous. It'd be interesting to see the results if a competition offered the challenge of, say, a 20-line limit. Or, given that lines might get rather long to compensate, if the limit was set at something like 200 words. My "Three Wishes", for example, which was in the last homework exercise, is 16 lines and 90 words.

Cheers
David

I agree David
I've mentioned before I'd like to see a 24 line limit competition,
the reason I like that is because you could have 2 Stanza's of 12 lines 3x8 4x6 or 12 couplets.
But any form of a short competition sounds like a good idea to me.

I think Meg makes a good point about 40 lines being about right for performing.

Cheers

Terry

Congratulations to Brenda, and also to the other poets who were placed in this competition.

Well done.

Cheers

Terry