| NPA 2001 |
Our
2001 UK Champion, voted for by prizewinning poets was Ann
Marsden.
Village postmistress Ann Marsden was the 2001 United Press UK Poetry Champion. Ann, from Skelton, Cleveland, won for her poem "Take This Aching Heart".
"I'm overwhelmed that so many prize-winning poets voted for me," she said.
As well as being postmistress in Skelton High Green she's a staff nurse at South Cleveland Hospital.
Ann's winning poem was inspired by personal tragedy. "I've been writing poetry for ten years but entering the National Poetry Anthology has given me my greatest thrill as a writer," she said.
Since its inception in 1999 the National Poetry Anthology has continued to grow; this edition was the first to include the work of poets from Northern Ireland and also the Channel Islands. There was a record number of entries and we were overwhelmed by the sheer variety of work that was submitted for the book. The most popular subject for poets to wax lyrical this year was the millennium.
WALKING
I
love the colour
of this kind of day,
subdued, softened, wild
wind washed with grey.
I
walk the road's blind
rise and gentle fall,
caught in my own veil of recall.
Dorothy Vernon, Ovingham, Northumberland
NOVEMBER GARDEN AT DUSK
Spiders
have slung their silver studded
Hammocks on the hedge,
The air is wet with mist,
The turf a heavy sponge that squeezes,
Worm casts through its open pores
In whorls of neat mud dark as chocolate
Black hatted toadstools are the pegs
In a horseshoe curve of darker green,
These things the dusk now wraps
Within its shawl -
Two yellow roses last of all.
John Hills, Sittingbourne, Kent
NUTTON SKIES (A poem for Stoke)
The
indeterminate sky,
A thin grey coffee.
Slowly pours down, hitting the horizon.
Begins, lazily to slosh
Through a cappuccino froth of cloud
Into this china landscape.
Settling,
In a sedate swirl,
Buffeting the thick sediment of buildings
That floats listlessly,
At the bottom of the cup
Where
Sky meets land.
J S Mason, Fowey, Cornwall
GREEN
Teenagers
are just junkies,
shooting up on music
twenty-four hours a day,
Which needles an older generation
brought up to believe
that you should show some consideration
and think of others.
Teenagers
are no better
than nightingales: loud-mouthed
Romeos, out of time,
spilling their passions onto the night streets
to break through the dreams
of those who lie untouched ... with slow heartbeats
of faded lovers.
Patricia Middleton, Teignmouth, Devon
MARCH EVENING
March
day closes,
Marauder like;
Stealing wavedrops from
Brownwaters of the Nothern sea,
Snatching cries from mewing gulls,
Hurling them up cliff faces
Towards a windswept sky:
Marc's tails in blue and gold,
Then tumbling them crying carthwards,
Startling boxing hares
On green downs below;
Echoing sounds
'March-March March'.
James Allen, Haverhill, Suffolk
COME APART AT THE SEAMS
The
tapestry is broken,
Loose strings left unattached,
Thrown to the side
Like a faulty batch
It comes apart at the seams, It's what happens,
When you play with other people's hearts.
Noel Rainford, Bolton, Greater Manchester
UNTIL WE MEET AGAIN
I
may not be with you
Wherever you go.
But wherever you travel
I want you to know.
My love crosses countries
And oceans of blue,
To the place in the world
Where it can find you.
Packed in your suitcase,
In your bag or rucksack.
My love will be with you
Till you find your way back.
And when you return,
And no longer roam,
My love is here waiting,
To welcome you home.
Katryna Jacobs, Newry, N Ireland
ISLAND, GONE SILENT
No
breath of wind disturbs the leaves,
Fine mist comes creeping from the sea,
Wrapping it's blankets on our avenue,
Creating silence
On this summer's eve.
No motorbike
Intrudes it's raucous noise
(Our island calendar has gone beyond TT);
The neighbours' laughing children
Are asleep,
No catis yet 'on prowl'....
It seems as if the garden
Has been soundproofed
For a while.
Hazel Moore, Douglas, Isle of Man
STAGES OF TIME
As
a baby, time crawls,
As a child, time sprawls
As a teen, it's pace accelerates
Into endless parties and hot dates,
As an adult, there's never enough
Your schedule always tough
As a parent, you haven't any
Not even for a penny
Not until we're near the grave
Does time aslow down
Till death us save.
Michelle McAteer, Cumbernauld, Scotland