Leaf Poetry Competition

I’ve just heard that my poem entitled (deep breath) “Pants Outside Trousers, Big Letter H On T Shirt, Here To Save The World” has been commended in the 2008 Leaf Poetry Competition. I am massively chuffed about this, because (a) I’ve always wanted to get into one of Leaf’s anthologies (having previously failed on more than one attempt) and (b) getting onto a poetry shortlist was one of my writing goals for 2009.

“Pants Outside Trousers etc.” (which is what Leaf call it in their e-mail to me) was previously a completely unexpected winner of the SlingInk monthly poetry challenge back in October of last year. The title was added at the last minute, and was originally “Pants Outside Trousers, Big Letter H On T Shirt”, and it was only when I had submitted it that I realised that it was an unconscious partial haiku. So I added a further five syllables when I did the edits. Oh, and there’s a reason why the title needs to be a haiku. But you’ll have to buy the anthology to find out 🙂

So 2009 is going to be all about poetry, then? Well, maybe. I still find it all a bit baffling. But anyway, I have signed up for The Write Idea‘s STIRRED POeT six-week rolling poetry competition, starting in February, and I will be fascinated to see what comes out of that.