Climate Change. Love. Boris. Body Shaming. Laundry. These were just some of the ideas explored by our young poets at the M4 Poetry Evening.
Visiting poet, Francesca Beard, who had run a poetry workshop with selected students during the afternoon, was present to judge the written poetry and recital competitions. These were colourful and hotly-contested, with Erin Macrae (Wh) winning the written poetry competition with her poem Another Day in Paradise?. The runners up were Sam Han (C) and Joanna Harvie (M).
The recital competition saw an impressive mixture of performers’ own work and some well-known poems from the canon.
Francesca Beard had a difficult task judging, but first place was won by Will Lovatt (H) for his entertaining recital of his own poem, Boris Bop, in which politicians were compared to sheep and we were all encouraged to just “relax”.
The inaugural Petrichor Poetry Prize was open to Lower School and M4 students and judged by the Headmaster and Governor George Pincus.
Mr Pincus was present at the M4 Poetry Evening to announce the winner and award prizes. The winning poets were Sophia Wilshin (Cr) in third place, Alex Pavry (Hu) in second place and Anna Gillespie (R) in first place with her impressive poem Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow.
It was lovely to see so many parents, staff and students there to celebrate the wonderful creativity of our young poets. As Francesca Beard said, they have learnt to use their words “wisely and playfully”.
Ms Tess St Clair-Ford
