Rattle the Hatches: Foyle Young Poets of the Year 2013 Winners Anthology

RECENT FOYLE ANTHOLOGIES

FROM THE POETRY SOCIETY Poems © the contributors 2014 . FYP logo: Siavash Pournouri Cover: James Brown, www.newdivision.com. Design: Michael Sims.

Published by The Poetry Society, 22 Betterton Street, London WC2H 9BX Tel: 020 7420 9880. www.poetrysociety.org.uk The anthology’s title, Rattle the Hatches, is from ‘Daughters’ by Phoebe Stuckes (p. 6).

RATTLE THE HATCHES POEMS BY THE FOYLE YOUNG POETS OF THE YEAR 2013 Presented by the Poetry Society

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The Poetry Society is deeply grateful to the Foyle Foundation for its generous funding and also to Arts Council England for its ongoing support. We also thank Bloodaxe, Faber & Faber, Frances Lincoln, Picador, Puffin, Walker Books, Macmillan, Seren and tall-lighthouse for continuing to provide book prizes for the Award.

We send our best wishes and gratitude to the judges, Hannah Lowe and David Morley, for their energy and enthusiasm in helping to make 2013’s competition the most successful year to date.

We thank Southbank Centre, London, for hosting the prize-giving ceremony and Divine Chocolate, Paperblanks and Poems on the Underground for offering exciting prizes for our winners. We also extend our thanks to the Arvon Foundation for hosting the Foyle Young Poets’ residency with commitment and expertise.

Our thanks to all at Cult Brand for their work in raising awareness of the competition, and our network of poets and educationalists across the UK for helping us to inspire so many young writers.

Finally, we applaud the enthusiasm and dedication of the young people and teachers who make Foyle Young Poets the great success it is today.

Find us online at foyleyoungpoets.org and on Facebook

talllighthouse

CONTENTS Introduction Phoebe Stuckes Dominic Hand Ila Colley Grace Campbell Laura Harray Ian Burnette Jessica Walker Lamorna Tregenza Reid Esme Partridge Caroline Harris Imogen Cassels Catriona Bolt Magnus Dixon Jennifer Burville-Riley Emma Lister

4 Daughters An Interior Scene Lipsill (Swedish for Cry Baby) Tidal Memory Dutch Baby Fox Chase Notes on a Piano I took God with me camping...

Ya’aburnee Swallows The Eloquent Crane ‘I am...’

Caution to the Woodsman Love is a knife with which I explore myself

6 7 8 10 11 12 14 15 16 18 20 21 22 24

List of commendations Foyle Foundation The Poetry Society and opportunities for young writers Enter the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2014

26 28 29 30 32

2014 entry form

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INTRODUCTION “The most striking aspect of Foyle Young Poets of the Year is the excellence of the entries; the other conspicuous quality is its massive global appeal. Foyle Young Poets has become a focus for poetic enterprise, achievement and daring. World poetry, you might say, begins here.”

David Morley, Foyle Judge 2013

Welcome to the latest edition of the winners’ anthology of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award. We celebrate another record for the Award, which this year attracted submissions from an impressive 7,478 young poets from a total of 75 countries – our widest reach yet. Founded by the Poetry Society in 1998, the competition has been supported by the Foyle Foundation since 2001 and is now firmly established as the key award for young poets aged between 11 and 17 years. This year’s competition drew entries from right across the world from Belgium to Barbados, Vietnam to Venezuela, and this year’s lucky winners (the 15 top winners and 85 commended poets) come from as far as Abuja in Nigeria and Kuala Lumpa in Malaysia. With such fierce global competition, to be selected by the judges as one of the top 100 is a remarkable achievement. Since it began 17 years ago, the Award has kick-started the career of some of today’s most exciting new voices, including the celebrated poets Caroline Bird, Ahren Warner, Helen Mort, Sarah Howe and Caleb Klaces. The Award represents a career-changing achievement for many. The phrase ‘Former Foyle Young Poet’ is now commonly found in professional writers’ biographies as alumni continue to make their mark on the wider literary world, their names appearing on bookshelves and at festivals the world over.

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The quality this year was, as ever, of world-class standard. Judge Hannah Lowe commented that “the 2013 Foyle entries indicate that young people’s poetry is at a very exciting point and full of confidence.

I was so impressed by the breadth of subject matter and the often mature stances young poets take. The elegiac poems were powerful, as were many of those about relationships – of friendship, romance and family.” David Morley praises the winning poems as “first-rate; markedly ambitious, keenly-wrought and thoughtful”.

This booklet features poems by the top 15 Foyle Young Poets of the Year 2013, and names the 85 commended poets selected by the judges. All winners receive one year’s Youth Membership of the Poetry Society, and a range of book prizes and goodies from our partner publishers and companies. The top 15 poets are invited to attend a week’s residential creative writing course at the Arvon Foundation’s Shropshire centre, The Hurst, or receive a poet residency in their school followed by distance mentoring (age dependent). All 100 winners benefit from on-going support and encouragement from the Poetry Society, via publication, performance and internship opportunities.

The Award also incorporates a year-round programme of activity aimed at encouraging creativity and literacy in schools. We offer additional poet-led workshops and resources to a number of Applauded schools, to reward their continuing commitment to and enthusiasm for the Award. Every year the scheme also nurtures best practice in creative writing teaching, identifying committed Teacher Trailblazers to act as mentors and share lesson ideas.

We hope you enjoy reading the poems in this anthology and that they inspire many more young poets to enter in 2014. Happy reading!

The Poetry Society, 2014

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PHOEBE STUCKES

DAUGHTERS Enough of pulling off high heels to run Or else waiting alone in unclaimed ugliness.

No more crying out for guitar heroes Or going back to old loves for the safety.

Let us build bonfires of those unanswered prayers Let us learn how to leave with clean and empty hearts Let us escape these attics still mad, still drunk, still raving Let us vacate these badly lit odd little towns Let us want none of what anchored our mothers Let us never evolve to be good or beautiful Let us spit and snarl and rattle the hatches Let us never be conquered Let us no longer keep keys in our knuckles Let us run into the streets hungry, fervent, ablaze.

You Are a mighty thing A captive animal, woken with a taste for blood.

Feed it, You Amazon, you Gloria, you Swiss army knife of a woman.

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DOMINIC HAND

AN INTERIOR SCENE Pieter de Hooch, Mother Lacing Her Bodice beside a Cradle, 1659-60

How lines structure these receding rooms – their polished floors and divided halls – is how light fractures in their passages.

Apertures divide the corridors: every angle strung to a balanced hold.

A mother sits enclosed by the shade, before a curtain fringed with copper light: her hand poised, threading a lace, over an empty cradle. The pictures on the walls withdraw into their muted scenes.

She has not seen that the evening is arriving, that the candle on the table has burnt out.

Taken by symmetries, we wait at the point of movement.

Her child in the distance, in a flood of light – already gone into the next room – drawn by the open door, ready to depart.

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ILA COLLEY

LIPSILL (SWEDISH FOR CRYBABY) Your doughy fists navigate through space, Orchestrated, the world seems to fold through the lines you dictate.

Darling, tell me why and how!

I’m teasing you, more than you understand, so Stand up for yourself. Soon you’ll conduct Language, I’ll breathe it into you, Your tongue will snake past the ambiguous mumblings of a, b, c, The loopholes of form and waves, Littered behind you as you stride Past the shallows of word-pinkie-word, Deeper, into the currents of holy fluency.

One day you, You’ll believe that the waves are your own, That you can hold molten marble in your fists; You, the great Creator Could never lose his bearings But your lips are cold as ice And you won’t taste the salt crystals forming Between your teeth until it’s too late.

But how! Your only virtue shackling you to the ocean bed, Eons spent with water in your lungs, but you still Can’t remember what you meant.

Lipsill, don’t spill Backwards. Don’t be silly now, Don’t look for lines in glazed eyes

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I can’t bear to see you stumble Over all the différance in the world, I heard You’re beginning to see fingernails between each word I heard you washed up on the shore last night, A colony of acorn barnacles in your skin, like Each reiteration you ever committed Sucking for repentance.

I heard you kept each one That you don them like kisses.

I’d like to wipe them away And hope that tomorrow You’ll say Something as clear as every tear And as curling as the taste of brine That hits your lips, so forget it now, Only in Danish is it too late for you to swim.

Please, you’re still translating yourself to me, Don’t worry that the intent was never yours, Don’t falter because you’re foolish We’ve been fooled by language before.

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GRACE CAMPBELL

TIDAL I

the rain saps the world of colour. compare it to the fretful hands of children, torrential piano scales; to a silver veil. streets waltz to the deserted seawall. he touches her arm. a surfeit of tenderness; rhymes “river” with “forever.” this gospel of waterweed and broken glass.

II

the swing park creaks, water glazed the river green and glutted, robbing corroded banks of earth. I have followed the river, seen it empty out into a saltwater estuary, beneath leaves like arrow tips or green lozenges shuddering under the violence of the downpour. At the land’s frayed edge two tides run into each other again across the mudflats. I stood like a footnote to the sea.

III

above, the rain falls for miles through the night to strike the roof of your house. across the sea the same sound will recall the surge of the north; a skirt of rain-washed rock a story ceaselessly uttering itself; that finds you again on the earth’s other curve water-born sons and daughters of the world.

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LAURA HARRAY

MEMORY I remember the fields like a vast green ocean blending with the scent of the sea on the breeze, or so it seemed from afar.

I saw the sky like an artist’s palette, lit up in majestic clouds of peach and purple and pink that fell over the hills as the sun set.

I knew the night; its velvet, its silk and its satin.

The stars and the sky were my brothers and the gentle winds my comforter.

It was my paradise, that place where two worlds met as with ends of a string. I tasted reality in the ripe fruit that hung from the spreading trees, I saw imagination caught within the shape of a seashell. I drank elixir from the winds in the hope that it would strengthen my body and my mind. And it did.

But now, I see what I saw no longer.

The sky I once knew has withered like a leaf and the wind I once felt is stale on the hills.

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IAN BURNETTE

DUTCH BABY In the bakery, my girl grips a pregnancy test like a pistol in her pocket.

The baker hands her the key to the restroom and leaves. In the back there’s a small window where he watches men and women and children – I don’t mind, I’ve learned I can’t protect anyone by now.

The raspberry danish in the pastry cabinet is the baker’s daughter, I’ve decided – bruised purple and swaddled in puff rope. I imagine

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the baker coming back from his window, filling my empty hands.

Here’s yeast, here’s flour, fruit and sugar and water – make more of her.

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JESSICA WALKER

FOX CHASE Last winter, in dim lit candlelight I would sit out on the iced terrace cloaked in my Gran’s old fur coat silence was soaked up by the late night traffic on the high street when the clock struck midnight the chime could be heard from Grandfather’s ancient clock it was then that two foxes would push their whiskered faces through hedges dancing into the frosted garden caught between snowflakes and the waning moonlight red stained tails tipped with white my Mother would call me in but I would stay out all night eyes fixed to the beauty of this fox chase, he would join me around one thirty in the morning my friend, the haunted ghost with a jagged scar up his wrist he would sing to me, and it was bliss

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LAMORNA TREGENZA REID

NOTES ON A PIANO In the candlelight of a foreign house, a woman serenades Mozart, Strauss.

She caresses her instrument’s fading keys like she caresses the child who sits on her knee.

In the speckled light of a tree-strewn yard, a man sheds a tear to the strains of Die Nacht.

He plants a lily, as fragile as bone, like his mother’s kisses by the piano at home.

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ESME PARTRIDGE

I TOOK GOD WITH ME CAMPING...

I took God with me camping.

Here God – this is a tent.

It leaks; round raindrops soak our bedclothes and we wake up with wet toes.

This is my dominant friend, ordering the poles, when she doesn’t know what the hell she is doing.

You made her God. These are my wellies.

Thank you for the gift of these and for the provision of money to buy them.

When I camp, they are (dare I say it) a God-send.

God, these are portaloos.

They are crap.

Yesterday’s grass stains, mud clumps and only you know what else, litter the hollow floor.

God, this is a zip.

It is the only thing standing between a thief and the contents of my purse.

My dominant friend declares, with hands on hips, she knows who did it.

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She has no more clue than the rest of us penniless sods staring down at open suitcases.

But someone did it God. They are one of six thousand on this campsite, spending my change on doughnuts and coke.

‘The Prodigal Son’ springs to mind, but God, that lesson is one of the hardest to learn.

Besides, forgiveness is not one of the ten commandments and Thou Shalt Not Steal is number 8.

I know you didn’t make our tent, the loos or zips... but why did you make all this rain?

Even my dominant friend calls on you God when she sees the state of the sky.

But now it is eleven pm and the dark that you called night.

This is a thermos flask: hot chocolate – would you like to taste?

This is a woolly hat, a hoodie, wellies that I haven’t removed since Thursday.

These are four folding chairs, arranged in a neat circle.

And above us, God, are all your stars.

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CAROLINE HARRIS

YA’ABURNEE I grew up in a town with crumbling houses of burning coals and crimson embers. The avenue where I lived always flooded during summer storms.

Even the picket fences and closed gates shook, water like moonshine under an iridescent sky. The children were still as the velvet dreams of sugarcane chapels made their mark.

I stare at my palms now, trace the pathways and birthmarks of my tired body, visit the worn and decaying houses of my hometown, rusting prisms frozen still against the charred alphabets of a broken avenue.

The great constellations never prepared me for the water, the floods of static words, harrowing breaths, a subtle storm.

I wish freight trains carried mermaids and pomegranate seeds, storms of stardust, tangerine lips, meadow tongues. Maybe then the marks this town leaves behind would be of crayon worlds watered down, of playdoh, folded juice boxes and smiles, of houses comprised of dolls and dolls comprised of houses and avenues of the kind of happy that isn’t lost in translation, of nights still.

I want to be “Cleopatra in a past life”. The girl with marble eyes still lined with dust. The girl with feet clapping in Morse Code, causing storms with a bat of the eye, a slope of the neck. Then maybe the avenues of my forearms could stretch forth and punctuate this ghost town, my mark

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one of patterns torn and blank stares worn and the houses, the kind of beautiful people write about: Vermeer light, thin as water.

I would wrap the town in sapphire wings, let it smell of rosewater infused with salt, jasmine flower, mustard yellow roots, still in the sign language of nighttime houses bowing under the rich weight of memories. I would storm through the aging husks of hypotheticals, let these times mark the beginning of all times. Fireflies would fill the lamplights on burning avenues.

Ya’aburnee, Ya’aburnee, You bury me, these avenues and city streets can only stay quiet for so long before the water runs dry, before the dusk sets in, before the sun falls. Their mark is in the lizards with quivering throats and the mesas raw, still singing their mourning songs, the houses trembling, lifted in the summer’s thousandth storm.

Bronze rain falls from the salmon skies. The urban paradise still waits for me, cobras on cement balconies. The storm tramples and roars, torpedoes on concrete sidewalks. I am home.

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IMOGEN CASSELS

SWALLOWS There was the run up of vicious gravel to the moment of the smooth stone floor, the yellow honey wash that is two homes to me.

The door, green, dark, the crumpled lines of insect netted in two of four corners.

The ceiling.

The nest that halved itself against the wall, the tightly woven sticks and clay of love, or instinct. The swallows: quick, sweet shadows that forked and lit over the beam.

The warmth in the light when we return from the rocks and darkening skies.

The wind through the lovely wishbone of their feathers makes them lucky.

And I am lucky too, as I wait outside the cottage door, to catch the thrum of learning wingbeats.

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CATRIONA BOLT

THE ELOQUENT CRANE I

Crystalline air and shadows surround the haiku of my wingbeat heartbeat songbeak opening to call a harshening cry on the echoing air.

II

Mountain air falling As a river through feathers And haunted sunlight.

III

Catch my form in its unrivalled gauche detailing – splaying wings and endless daddy-long-legs’ legs.

IV

The descent is flustered, the picture of ruffled feathers.

V

Stillness on one leg Caught as a clear-cut tableau: The Eloquent Crane.

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MAGNUS DIXON

‘I AM...’

I am Magnus Who needs the salt spray of waves, the reassuring slap of wake and the controlling shouts of “Starboard!” and “Water!”

Who loves the cold push of wind against sail, hull against body, the inquisitive face of the seal and the water’s tingling lapping motion, Who sees the waves race to the pier, the surge of a gust darkening the liquid turquoise sea; the boat heeling, pushed by the wind’s giant hand, Who hears the gentle creaking of the boom, the cawing of indignant seagulls chased off a picnic and the rumbling engines of a Peterhead trawler as it leaves port, Who hates the pungent oil slick on the marina bed, the floating, drifting, plastic bag like a brick wall on a motorway and the absence of the sailor’s deity, the wind, Who fears the rope’s shadow in his hand will disappear, that the wind might dwindle as if going to sleep and that water will swirl upwards from a jagged hole cut by the rocks that waylay passing ships, Who dreams of first light’s rays clutching the sea, coating it in golden light; the water surrounding his head forcing its way into his ears and being enclosed by sound, sound, sound,

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Who wants to restrain the dusk and force it back, to blow on the sun with silver-vapour breath and see it brighten like a spark and to make himself a robe out of the sea and carry the salt scent, the sounds of terns and gulls and the gusts of wind in its pockets, Who pretends land is sea, school is a ship sailing into the frozen north and that the wind whispers praise, Who worries about the sea evaporating, boiling and steaming, the seal vanishing forever, the clouds retreating and pollution’s smog, a deadly sea-haar engulfing the coast, Who cries when he sees the sand eels floundering on the harsh grey rock and the gull ensnared in fish-hunting threads, Who tries to co-ordinate himself with the weather, the wind, the sea, to throw up water, carving the sea into a fizzing blizzard with speed and to clear the buoy in an arc like a waterborne eagle, Who hopes that the sun will not set, plummeting into water, gold to blue, hot to cold, eagle to river, fire to paper, burning the sea, Dixon.

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JENNIFER BURVILLE-RILEY

CAUTION TO THE WOODSMAN Oh foolish woodsman, the whispering reeds are not sharing their secrets but shooing you, shooing you far from this place.

See how the tar-black pools deny your inquisitive eyes, concealing their treasures possessively with a mirrored shield of silvered sky as the water feigns to embrace your reflection but stays your invasion, stays your invasion.

Fleeting wings shimmy the chevron leaves, flitting like phantoms through trembling curtains of shadow and light at the edge of your mind’s roosting eye, never in sight, never in sight.

Limbs grow crooked, twist from your reach, sallow and alder seeking relief from the soothing grey lichens that carefully bandage time’s lingering wounds.

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Velveted moss beds bruise at the weight of your imprint steps as scattered leaves curl, furling hollow inside their own hearts, hoarse with their dry-lipped hiss at you, hiss at you.

Foolish woodsman, ferns seem to greet you with nodding caress but the fronds are bestowing a last-rite embrace as you raise up the axe and hard-swing the heft, earth-umbilical cleft, cleft, cleft.

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EMMA LISTER

LOVE IS A KNIFE WITH WHICH I EXPLORE MYSELF I

I marry my husband on a day that does not exist. He has Song-of-Solomon eyes, a bright, forgiving mouth – a kissing mouth. The birds watch from the walls when I forget to speak.

The washing lines swirl like planets, the sea between the sheets.

II

He says, “Take this. Blood of my blood.

Knead it in you.”

I cradle it – a small angel in a bucket – it is white and tiny as a star.

There is a time to reap, a time before the flood.

III

I saw six eyes in my mother’s cotton womb.

Now they follow me wherever we go.

The day I learn to fly, I will not land.

Climb the dandelions and sleep, eighteen days with the moon.

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IV

Still. I have a soft segmented heart, a pillar of salt which, day by day, condenses.

Came out of nothing – I’d been washing the dishes – gone before they dried.

V

His voice commands. The blue is beating, hot.

It is not God, he tells me. You are not good.

I take my daughter’s hand. There is no love but words to get what you want.

VI

There is a time to sow. Sculpt. Mould. Praise what you find.

Yet this, I do not see it coming. Nor the new world, on the end of a blade that stabs me into the next life.

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FOYLE YOUNG POETS OF THE YEAR 2013 CONGRATULATIONS TO THE COMMENDED POETS

Dalia Ahmed, Madeline Anderson, Isla Anderson, Hanel Baveja, Yasmin Belkhyr, Heather Booton, Alex Bowes, Hannah Broderick, Hannah Burke, India-Rose Channon, Eleanor Coy, Daniella Cugini, Si么n Davenport, Joseph Davison-Duddles, Flora de Falbe, Anna Doak, Hannah Farr, Rory Finnegan, Isabella Fox, Katherine Frain, Iolanthe Francis-Brophy, Iona Freeman, Jonathan Gausden, Alex Greenberg, Hugo Grundy, Sofia Haines, Haroun Hameed, Aisling Harrington-Brown, Elizabeth Hawkins, Rachel Herring, Rosemarie Ho, Ciara Hodgkinson, Catherine Hodgson, Tallulah Hutson, Phyllida Jacobs, Hannah January, Joshua Kam, Joshua Kimelman, Joanne Koong, Holly Law, Anna Leader, Dillon Leet, Fangzhou Liu, Nasim Luczaj, Christine Marella, Gazelle Mba, Conor McKee, Stephen Meisel, Niamh Merritt, Harvey Moldon, Harsha Pattnaik, Iris Pearson, Julia Pearson, Taraneh Peryie, Laura Potts, Carlos Price-Sanchez, Christina Qiu, Sophia Qureshi, Brynnie Rafe, Laura Rosenheim, Elena Saavedra Buckley, Ankita Saxena, Anushka Shah, Alexander Shaw, Max Sheaf, Amanda Silberling, Alice Soewito, Jay Stonestreet, Alex Tan, Oriana Tang, Charis Taplin, Claudia Taylor, Adriane Tharp, Phoebe Thomson, Julia Tompkins, Poppy-Louise Tully, Catherine Valdez, James van Blankenstein, Sophie van Waardenberg, Zainab Viqar, Madeleine Votaw, Victoria White, Kinga W贸jcikowska, Madelyne Xiao, Alexander Zhang.

For a wealth of ideas on where to go next with your poetry, visit youngpoetsnetwork.org.uk

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FOYLE FOUNDATION “The Foyle Foundation and the Poetry Society have been on an amazing journey over the last 14 years in developing The Foyle Young Poets. During this time the scheme has grown to become a major programme and literary award attracting thousands more applicants as we have pioneered new ways of targeting and reaching young people and schools.�

David Hall, Chief Executive, The Foyle Foundation

The Foyle Foundation is an independent grant making trust supporting UK charities which, since its formation in 2001, has become a major funder of the Arts and Learning. The Foyle Foundation has invested in the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award since 2001, one of its longest partnerships. During this time it has trebled its support and enabled the competition to develop and grow to become one of the premier literary awards in the country. foylefoundation.org.uk

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THE POETRY SOCIETY The Poetry Society is Britain’s leading voice for poets and poetry.

Founded in 1909 to promote “a more general recognition and appreciation of poetry”, the Society is now one of the country’s most dynamic arts organisations, with nearly 4,000 members around the world; and is the publisher of the leading poetry magazine, The Poetry Review. With innovative education and commissioning programmes, and a packed calendar of performances, readings and competitions, the Poetry Society champions poetry for all ages.

As well as the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award, the Poetry Society offers lots of other opportunities for young writers: Young Poets Network: If you’re an emerging poet, an avid reader, an enthusiastic performer, or just starting out in poetry, the Poetry Society’s Young Poets Network will help develop your poetry skills.

There you will find workshops, writing challenges and professional feedback, together with exciting features on every aspect of reading, writing and performing poetry. There’s also a list of opportunities for young writers, such as other poetry competitions, magazines and writing groups. From preparing poetry submissions and reading at an open mic, to finding an internship or setting up your own magazine, we’ve a lively community of young and established poets ready to share their advice and experiences. Contributors include Benjamin Zephaniah, Jo Shapcott, Daljit Nagra and Imtiaz Dharker.

Register at youngpoetsnetwork.org.uk and ‘like’ us at facebook.com/youngpoetsnetwork SLAMbassadors UK is the Poetry Society’s national spoken word competition for young people, open to 12-18 year olds. Prizes include a masterclass weekend at the Poetry Society with Slam Champion

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Joelle Taylor and a live performance at a prestigious London venue.

Judges and mentors have included Linton Kwesi Johnson, Dizraeli and Scroobius Pip. Workshops are available to schools and youth groups. To learn more visit slam.poetrysociety.org.uk Poetry Society Youth Membership is open to anyone aged 11-18 and costs £15 per year. Members receive free books, posters and the Poetry Society magazine Poetry News. All 100 winners of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award receive a year’s free membership as part of their prize.

School Membership and Poets in Schools: School members receive books, magazines and resources such as Poems on the Underground posters. All member schools receive a free Poets in Schools consultancy service – expert guidance on organising poet visits or Inset sessions. Specially tailored lesson plans, longer term poet residencies and poet-led showcase events can also be arranged. The Poets in Schools consultancy service is also available to non-member schools for a small fee. Visit the Poetry Society shop to see our exciting range of poetry posters and more.

For details about all of our projects, visit poetrysociety.org.uk/ content/education or email education@poetrysociety.org.uk

DONATE AND HELP YOUNG POETRY WRITERS THRIVE The Poetry Society’s work with young people and schools across the UK has changed the lives of many emerging readers, writers and performers of poetry, developing confidence and literacy skills, encouraging self-expression and opening up new life opportunities. Show your support for our programme by donating at poetrysociety.org.uk/donate

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ENTER THE FOYLE YOUNG POETS AWARD 2014 JUDGES: SIMON BARRACLOUGH & GRACE NICHOLS Any writer between the ages of 11 and 17 (inclusive) on the closing date of 31 July 2014 can enter the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2014. The competition is free to enter and poems can be of any length. Individuals may enter more than one poem. Please consult the rules of the competition before sending your entries, published in full at poetrysociety.org.uk/content/competitions/ fyp/rules Please concentrate on drafting and redrafting your poems –quality is more important than quantity! Entries cannot be returned under any circumstances so please keep copies. Due to the large number of entries, we are unable to respond to entrants individually.

Enter online at foyleyoungpoets.org or photocopy the entry form on the inside back cover and send it, with your poems, to: FYP 2014, The Poetry Society, 22 Betterton Street, London WC2H 9BX. Please mark the back of each poem with the entrant’s name and postcode. Teachers can request class set entry forms (to enter poems from whole classes) and free resources (Foyle anthologies, promotional posters and special Foyle lesson plans) by emailing fyp@poetrysociety.org.uk. Download the Foyle lesson plans at poetryclass.poetrysociety.org.uk Prizes include a week-long residential writing course at one of the prestigious Arvon Centres, poet visits to schools, Poetry Society Youth Membership, an invitation to the prestigious prize-giving ceremony in London, and an exciting range of books and poetry goodies. The top 15 winners’ poems will be printed in an anthology, just like the one you’re holding right now, and sent to schools, libraries and poets right across the UK and beyond.

To enter online, and for some hints and tips on writing a winning poem, go to foyleyoungpoets.org 32

FOYLE YOUNG POETS AWARD 2014 INDIVIDUALS: use this form or enter online at foyleyoungpoets.org TEACHERS: to submit multiple entries, use a Class Set Entry Form

available at foyleyoungpoets.org or email fyp@poetrysociety.org.uk

ADDRESS _________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________ POSTCODE ______________________ COUNTRY ______________________________ YOUR SCHOOL ________________________________________________________________ YOUR TEL MOBILE PREFERRED __________________________________________________ YOUR EMAIL

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

NUMBER OF POEMS SUBMITTED

__________________________________________________________

DATE OF BIRTH ___________________________ GENDER ETHNIC BACKGROUND

MALE

FEMALE

OPTIONAL ______________________________________________________________

The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2014, judged by Simon Barraclough and Grace Nichols, is open to writers between the ages of 11 and 17 years (inclusive) on the closing date of 31 July 2014.

Poets can enter more than one poem, of any length and on any theme. Competition entries cannot be returned under any circumstances so please make sure you keep copies. Please write the entrant’s name and postcode on the reverse of each poem submitted. Please consult rules before sending entries, published in full at: poetrysociety.org.uk/content/competitions/fyp/rules Please photocopy, complete and return this entry form and send it, with your poems, to: FYP 2014, The Poetry Society, 22 Betterton Street, London WC2H 9BX or enter online at foyleyoungpoets.org The Poetry Society has created a FREE online community to keep you updated with opportunities for young writers. If you do NOT wish to join the Young Poets Network, please tick here

ENTRY FORM 2014

NAME ______________________________________________________________________________

ABCDEFG

THE POETRY SOCIETY PRESENTS POEMS BY THE 15 FOYLE YOUNG POETS OF THE YEAR 2013, SELECTED BY HANNAH LOWE & DAVID MORLEY