ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

The Cervantes Art Festival is on again, and we will once again be holding a written poetry competition.
Please see the entry form below for information.

There will also be a Poets breakfast on Sunday morning outside the Cervantes Community Centre - if anyone is travelling through that area, please feel free to call in and participate!! (Dave & Terry - hope to see you both there again this year!!)

Cervantes Art Festival
WRITTEN BUSH POETRY COMPETITION
Cervantes Recreation Centre
October 27th- 1st Nov. 2011


ENTRY FORM – BUSH POETRY WRITTEN COMPETITION

Name ………………………………………………….

Address ……………………………………………………

………………………………….………………………….Post Code …………….

Phone…………………………….. email…………………………………….

Titles of entries:

1. ……………………………………………………………………..

2. …………………………………………………………………….

3. …………………………………………………………………….

4. …………………………………………………………………….

This competition is an OPEN event for ORIGINAL verse having good RHYME and METRE.
Previously published poetry that has not won a first prize in any written competition will be accepted.
A4 size pages should be used keeping each entry separate, using one side of the paper only.
Entries should be typed where possible.
Maximum of 40 lines/poem.
Cover sheets should be used. Entrant’s names or other details must not appear on any of the poems.
Cheques or money orders for the total amount of entry fees should be made out to Cervantes Cultural Committee and must accompany all entries.
CLOSING DATE. Entries received no later than 14th October, 2011 will be accepted.
Copyright remains with the author.
Poems may be published in an anthology for sale.
The Winners will be announced on the Opening Night, Friday 29th October 2011
The Judges decision will be final and no further correspondence will be entered into.

I declare the enclosed verse is entirely my own work and that it conforms to the above conditions. I agree to be bound by these conditions and accept the judge’s decision as final.


Signed…………………………………………….. Date…………../……../ 2011

ENTRY FEE: $5 per poem – Open. $2 per poem - Juniors
Extra poems can be listed on a separate cover sheet. Entry forms may be copied.

PRIZES:
Open – 1st Prize - $250
Junior – 1st Prize - $100

Post to: Cervantes Art Festival Poetry Competition
C/- Irene Conner
Box 584
Jurien Bay WA 6516

Email to: iconner21@wn.com.au

Only a week to go to closing date for the written competition.
Get your entries in now if you are going to!!

If any poets happen to be around the Jurien/Cervantes area on the sunday morning (30th October), please feel free to join in the poets breakfast - we will be having walk ups.
Feature poets are:
Corin Linch
Dave Smith
Terry Piggot
Brian Langley
Barry Higgins

Look forward to receiving your entries, and seeing some of you on the sunday.
Irene

My apologies to everyone - I just posted the awards for this competition, along with the judges comments - and they have disappeared!!! Gremlins!!
I have to head off to work now, so will re-post them tonight!!

Catchya
IRene

Here is the missing post - that disappeared into cyber space!!!
I cheated - I continually pressed the 'back' button on my browser until I got back to this page, then re-submitted it!!!
Clever eh???

My apologies for being a little late getting these in.
The awards for the Cervantes written competition are as follows:

Winner Walking With Ghosts - Terry Piggott, Canning Vale WA

Highly Commended A Bushman's Farewell – Terry Piggott, Canning Vale. WA
Ned Kelly's Epitaph – Tom McIlveen, Port Macquarie NSW
Spirit of Matilda – Brenda Joy, Charters Towers. Qld
Drover Dreaming – Donald Crane, Toowoomba. Sth Qld

Commended A Changing of the Guard – Terry Piggott, Canning Vale. WA
Where the Dreaming Wind Might Blow – David Campbell, Beaumaris. Vic
Creative Treasure – Joyce Gaul, Dalby. Qld
Summer Thunder – Joyce Gaul, Dalby. Qld


Congratulations to all who received the above awards. For those who didn't place, as you can see by the judges comments below, it was not because many of them were not 'good enough'. Again this year, there are a large percentage of entries that are of a winning standard, and could indeed win in any other competition. Unfortunately, they cannot all win, and so the judge has to make that difficult decision.
Thank you to all who have entered. For myself, I believe I have the best job of all, as I get to read the entries - without having to make any decisions on them - before sending them off to be judged!!!!!
I have included the Judges comments below.

Judges comments

Having read and re-read the many entries to this competition, once again I find myself 'blown away' by some very brilliant, expressive "Bush Poetry" , in particular those I have rated, "Commended" or better

That is not to say that the others are failures, far from it, for most were of a very high standard but, being a judge means that I must rank the submissions as I see them. I took into account the storyline, its originality and logical progression as well as the use of various poetic tools which embellish the written verse. I pay little heed to 'perfection' in grammar and punctuation, sufficient that they are in keeping with the poem and are consistent. These features of a poem do not appear in the entry criteria and I would only use them to split otherwise inseparable poems. I do however pay particular attention to the entry requirement of "very good and consistent Rhyme and metre" I must be able to pick up the poem for the first time and read it out loud without having to stop and ponder over how a word should be stressed - such factors should flow automatically. A few entrants have yet to achieve this.

As to Rhyme, whilst most were able to achieve 'perfection' several poems suffered from the "almosts", abandoned DOES NOT rhyme with stranded, nor do Stops and Spots - While these and quite a few other similar misrhymes have the feature known as assonance (ie sounding similar) and are often used in song, they do not fit the written "Bush Poem" - In Performance poetry, with a good performer, you may get away with it, but not in a written verse competition.

I was pleased that very few resorted to "forced rhyme" where a word is included purely for its rhyming and has little to do with the story, leaving the reader just that bit confused.

Just a few poems had some slight issues with continuity and a couple with location, time and similar concepts (ie here and there and was and is )

One entrant obviously failed to read the entry criteria and submitted a poem in Free verse. This was NOT the forum for such poems. It is the same as entering a jar of Jam in a Cake competition, both are food, but there's little else in common. There are plenty of other competitions for such poetry.

There were some VERY interesting poetic tools used in some of the entries, including some quite complex verse structure, internal rhyme, enjambment, syntax variations, metaphors etc. etc - such tools (if not overdone) enhance the poem considerably.

I did find, once again that most of the "better" poems had reminiscence as their base theme - perhaps this is a feature of older, more experienced poets, but I have no way of being sure.

The one junior entry deserves commendation for although being deficient in consistency (many adults suffer this same problem) great effort was taken with rhyme and with the overall theme and progression. These concepts are difficult for one of such tender years (8) to grasp. I look forward in hope of seeing this young person's poetry develop as he or she matures.

Thank you to all the entrants - To those in the "top" listing, keep it up, to those who are still ';emerging' don't despair, read the works of the masters, both traditional and contemporary, read also the various notes put out by those who are willing to pass on their expertise and use these to add that little more finesse to your work. Keep persevering, but remember that inspiration and perfection are both very fickle mistresses.
Regards
to all

Some worthy winners there - Good on you boys and girls...once again you do yourselves and ABPA proud

Cheers

Maureen


ps Irene your computer skills are truly 'mazing

Once again a big THANK YOU Irene, if it wasn't for your untiring efforts there wouldn't be a Cervantes, or a Boyup Brook Competition.

Your dedication to the Bush Poetry scene here in WA is very much appreciated.

Terry

Congratulations to all the winners and place getters! Good to see some familiar names up there, and good to see some new names as well.

And a big pat on the back to you IRene for retyping all those entries to display. I reckon that next year you should ask people to email in their entries and post the entry fee, it would save you a LOT of typing, wouldn't it?

or better yet email the entry and direct deposit straight into your groups bank account - do you realize that a money order now for $20 costs $6.90 that's bloody daylight robbery and not everyone has cheque accounts these days. Direct deposit is easy and fast /


Cheers.

Maureen