Live Canon are fundraising for our annual Children’s Poetry Competition!
This is one of the most important events in our calendar.
Our competition for children and young people is free to enter and comes with a pack of resources sent to schools as inspiration. It gives 100 young poets a chance to be published in our Children’s Anthology, and a prize to the winner in each age category, as well as to the school that sent the best entry so that we can celebrate excellent teachers as well.
This is an opportunity for the poets of the future to develop their craft and build their confidence, as well as simply an opportunity for young people to get serious about creative work in an educational landscape where those are increasingly few and far between.
But we need to fundraise to make it happen. The competition has to be free in order that any child in any part of the country can take part, so we need your help. Please help us to provide this much needed opportunity to our young people, we will be extremely grateful for a donation of any size.
For a taste of the sheer brilliance of the work we receive, check out the winners of last year’s Reception-Year 3 prize, Winter, and Year 10-13 prize, The Solar Panel Debate (and how butterflies can settle it)
Winter
Clara Kelly
Suddenly a winter wind,
Coming from the north,
Starts to howl.
That wind promised snow.
Then a thick, cold, icy downpour starts.
Bucketing it down now, the rain beats against numb fingers in gloves.
The freezing shower turns into splattering hail.
Darkness looms over the world.
Everyone is running frantically, trying to outrun the cold, wet mist,
slipping on ice.
When the unseeable wall has fallen, a swirling snowstorm starts,
knocking things over in its path.
Suddenly the snowstorm dies away.
With a clatter the hailstones whoosh away.
Somebody waves their friend back home.
With a howl, the wind dies too.
Everything,
It seems,
Is calm.
The Solar Panel Debate (and how butterflies can
settle it)
Elsie Hayward
All anyone could talk about,
An invasion, its shadow
Hung over the view itself,
That uncreased cut-out
From a picture book of someone’s childhood.
It found its way into every conversation
Out in the lane, with the dog pulling,
Impatient for his walk, but them not stopping,
Not giving any opening, searching your eye
For the glint of an ally. It found its way
Onto the notice board in the corner,
Bright red pin, all caps, scathing attack
On the panels, clipped, angry font.
It threatened to split the view
And the village.
After all, this is a nice village,
The world isn’t dying on our doorsteps.
No-one wants to wake each morning,
Stand on the balcony, coffee in hand,
Have their eyes insulted like that;
That metallic scar, that stain
On the picture pinned against the French windows
So many miles from drowning Bangladesh.
Then I walk in on you sunbathing,
You jewel-sheened, silken thing,
You tapestry from fairy fingers,
You, so slight you make us reconsider
What it means to be there,
You, who move in whispers,
You iridescent treasure,
You, hiding rainbows
Among your skirts, I see you
Lounging on the arm of a garden bench
In midday rays that coax
Unbelievable colours,
Persuade them to sing.
Your antennae twitch, your wings rise,
Those patterned panels.
You feel a breeze and snatch it
And are gone, fully charged, the sun
Soaked deep into your always-working wings.
The sun’s fingers, they have wound up your clockwork.
