ENGLISH CATEGORY
The Circuit
On ring, ring, open wide and let us out! –
Anne Frank
It is summer and the eerie beat
Of madness in Europe trembles the
Wings of the butterflies along the canal. –
Patrick Kavanagh.
1. Anne Frank’s House
From a blacked-out upper window I can see
the gauzy 1940s, a barge parked
in the neat canal, a girl going past on a bicycle.
Walls no longer hold their breath, they talk,
flickering on each cleared-out floor a further part
of the looped story, as the tourist file unwinds
to wander the dim levels. A monochrome rose
pearled with dew. Snipped from a magazine. Pasted up.
Star of. Church window. Sacred. I can
find
no trace of the irrepressible being whose kiss
would crumple the walls, send ripples, sparks,
connections
down traintracks, shivery lines of canal water.
2. The Rijksmuseum: Rembrandt Self Portrait
When did she join us? Darkhaired girl, one step
ahead, as, shuffling past, we graze with our eyes
the curls’ lit filaments, warm burrow of his gaze
tailing us downstairs into the cooling sun.
3. Skating Rink
Beneath the museum, a walkway, echoing arch
of traintunnel dimness, then unshuttered day, re-entry.
At the edge of some acres of unfenced grass, an eddy
of swirling laughter and faces. I miss her glance
again, but she’ll come round again, her line
woven freehand into those joyous orbits.
4. The Van Gogh Museum
Each one a handprint, whorl of a furious decade.
Tall, red leggings, black skirt, grey fleece jacket,
white hair in a neat ponytail, she’s a witness
to oranges, apples, pears, a frothy platter
of ochres, grapegolds airy as new-blown glass
blazing and brimming its borders to spill and colour
the flat wood frame
sky-billowing, open wide ...
Here is a window to hover, thumbed with light.
Mark Granier (1st Prize, Adult)
Mother and Daughter
I’ve seen them
on the neither-sideness
of a smoky bridge,
in the early hours of darkness,
streetlights melting
into the fog as if they were wax,
and the scene as clear
as rice paper –
a mother at her wit’s
end folds a sort of scream
into a shawl and steps
onto the bridge;
a smiling daughter left at home,
a note pinned to her vest:
– This one is easy to love,
so I have left her;
only I could bear
her angry little sister.
I may have invented, after the fact,
the sound of paper and feather
weights breaking the water,
a rustling in the leaves along
the shore, marking some sort of flight,
a moorhen or an otter.
Jerm Curtin (2nd Prize, Adult)
Personal Pronoun
I am the first person, singular,
A girder, an exclamation mark.
I am a bone, a yellowed femur.
Capitalised, in the Ionic style,
I have grown durable, the single column
That outlives the passing of empires.
I am a phallus, a stele,
A digit, raised in admonition.
In the literature of every age
My fine-honed identity is indispensable.
I am the nail that is driven through each text,
And my shadow stretches, like that of the Cross,
Into eternity.
Dáithí de Buitléir (3rd Prize, Adult)
The Fiddle Maker
Violins hang like Stalactites
In his cluttered cave,
Dangling from rough rafters.
The Irish Times, cases, violas,
Photos and charts,
Prize certificates, qualifications and
Sketches of mushrooms
Glorify his cavern.
A place for everything
And everything finds it’s own place,
Scrolls, sound-boxes, drills,
infinite multitude of accoutrements,
Violins shining and shadowy,
Every blemish well earned,
Superior in their old age.
Bereft of strings, bridges and necks.
Half-naked, embarrassed in their exposure
Cringing, convalescent violins hang
Jealous of their polished peers
Suspended, scrolls betwined,
On the front-row meat-hooks
A lengthy chat:
Sick of the Euro,
Bloody mobile phones,
Criticising Chinese fiddles,
Glorifying Guarneri,
Reviving recent palaver,
Hasty goodbyes and out the door
For fear of death by chit-chat.
Ferdia Ó Corragáin (1st Prize, Under 17)
My Mum
Maybe her tongue was blunt
For never did I hear her say
Anything
But Love.
You could not measure her Yes’s
Next to the sky
So High
They were.
Her face, smooth Pond’s
Cold cream
Masked ...
But then again
So intelligent,
Complicated a woman,
Like the ocean
You
Never knew
The depths of the
Shining surface?
Alexandra Kavanagh (2nd Prize, Under 17)
Ovid
And so the poet spoke: listen:
I am a mouthpiece, I am a vessel
of extraordinary power, mightier
than the sword. I am here, and then,
and everywhere: by the grace of God
I will be forever.
I will live past you and your children,
past the boundaries of ages,
on unto the limits of time, until fire
and water cover us, and paper
no longer exists.
I will sing my songs into space
until that space is airless and dry
of life, until the stars are out
and weeping, until the space
is space no longer.
I will be known without limit,
no corner of earth will ignore me,
no tribe will not know me,
people will give their lives
over to me.
Oh, I will be as the gods,
an immortal, my words
spanning lives and lives
and lives and lives,
and each age as it passes
will pick new meanings
from the tapestry of my life.
Lyndsay Coo (3rd Prize, Under 17)
My Sky
You are the ever changing artist;
On the ceiling of my world,
Scottie dogs or battle ships,
Laughing frogs I see,
Or just my imagination,
Playing tricks on me,
You make the night so pretty,
With your many twinkling stars,
And now again you drop one,
So I can make a wish,
Your fluffy bouncy clouds,
Drifting past like dodgems,
Going somewhere, nowhere,
Blocking out my sun,
Metal birds making snowy roads,
On your endless highway,
Clear foggy dark distant sky,
You cushion my moon
And hold my rainbows,
You change all the landscapes,
To the colours of your mood,
You make the ocean welcome,
When you turn it turquoise blue,
And yet so angry,
When grey comes over you.
I wish I could reach you,
And make believe you’re candy floss,
but I would just get a belly ache,
And my mum would just get cross.
Rebekah Isabella Brett-Pitt (1st Prize, Under 12)
The Drayonought
The sky was as black as a witch’s cloak,
The waves rolled over, the bay was soaked,
The moon rose high, up in the sky,
The night I saw the sinister eyes.
The pinpoint stars danced around the moon,
The nightingales sang a melodic tune.
Nocturnal owls were hooting away,
Cats chased mice after sleeping all day.
All these creatures you probably know of,
But hiding amongst the trees, there was
A mythical beast, the Drayonought,
The life ‘twas true to him he sought.
He was destined to live high up in the mountains,
There he would be a faithful king
To creatures you find in your wildest dreams,
The ones you would never have possibly seen.
Like the dragon and the phoenix
With hideaways so scenic,
Like the unicorn and the shiver,
Who live down by the river.
But the Drayonought is the sacred one,
The beast who speaks in arcane tongue,
Who resembles the dragon in many ways
And managed to escape the Minotaur’s maze.
The one who survived the Endangal Wars,
The one whose knowledge even flaws
The wizards of the coven of Everest.
Who are meant to be wiser than the best.
Lolling from his mouth are two spearlike tongues,
He has seven long tails rather than one.
Unlike the dragon’s rough horns
Unlike the dragon’s rough horns
He has two ears that are badly torn.
He has large glowing eyes
And he flies through the skies,
He glides over the trees
And in his path evil flees.
But back to the bay we now shall travel,
Now history has had its time to unravel.
Back to where I went for an evening stroll,
Where I helped this creature reach his goal.
I walked along the shadowed footpath
Where an uncanny shadow was about to be cast.
A shiver ran cold, down my spine,
When I realised the shadow was not mine.
I could feel my hair stand on end.
Was this creature foe or friend?
I stared up high in the sky
Then I spotted the sinister eyes.
Two large glowing eyes hung above me,
Then more appeared out of this queer body.
Soon, hovering above my head was the mythical
Drayonought
Then’s when I fled.
But everywhere this creature followed me,
Soon I stopped to listen to his story
About a great sorceress who gave him a curse,
The curse that brought him back down to earth.
But only a human, the mortal beings
Can send him back to where he was the king.
So that is what I did, I sent him back
But never shall I remember that.
I’d never know
I’d never see
I’d always be,
Just Me.
Francesca Reece (2nd Prize, Under 12)
Granny's Fiddlebag
Granny’s fiddlebag is
the most nicest
thing on earth.
Combs, blusher and
Lumps of dirt,
Tasty treats leftover
From parties.
A tasty bun, a pack
Of Smarties,
Her Rosy Red lipstick
And her crumbly
Leftover chipstick.
You never know
What could be
In Granny’s bag
A monster, a
U.F.O.,
Come on I’ll give
You a show.
Christine Rubalcava (3rd Prize, Under 12)