Quilt A Poem Competition - Bailieborough

I judged the Quilt A Poem Competition, sponsored by Cara Pharmacy and Beauty which was part of Bailieborough Poetry Festival. We were delighted with the response to this competition and the number and quality of the entries.

It was a difficult task to pick a shortlist and a winner but I enjoyed the challenge. The standard was very high, I can now see why I fail in some many poetry competitions.

I was impressed by the number of poets who started from scratch and came up with a great poem based on a quilt in the relatively short time involved. It was clear also that some found a poem already written which chimed with something in a quilt and entered it. No problem with that either.

The variety of approach was also impressive. Some wrote of the process of quilting, created a story behind the quilting or made quilting a metaphor for something else, including for writing a poem.

I created a longlist of about seventeen fairly easily but cutting that down to ten was difficult with various poems entering and leaving on each new reading. One poem did stand out at this stage and it became the winner.

And the winner was Annette Skade from west Cork for her poem Wedding Quilt. Pictured above with Paddy Halligan, chair LitLab, and myself.

The results are here on the website and the winning and highly commended poems are on this page. Paddy Smith, LitLab member, videoed the prizegiving and has uploaded the proceedings onto YouTube. Search for Bailieborough Poetry Festival in YouTube to find them.

The one thing I haven't had the courage to do yet is look at the full list of those who entered. I'm there are many well-known poets and friends among those. Maybe better not to know!

Bailieborough Poetry Festival 2013

The first Bailieborough Poetry Festival on Friday and Saturday was a great success. Friday night's launch of the anthology by Nessa O'Mahony with readings by the LitLab members, Nessa and anthology editor, Barbara Smith was a most enjoyable, well attended event.

The venue, Bia Restaurant, Bailieborough, was perfect, the food was very good, the MC Paddy Smith had some wonderfully bad puns in his introductions and the audience responded very well to the various tones of the readings. The anthology is called Under a Thrupenny Moon and should be available for purchase online at the festival website soon.

Nessa's workshop on Saturday morning, which focused on imagery, had twelve participants all of whom responded enthusiastically to Nessa's thoughtful and challenging exercises. She conducted the workshop with her customary enthusiasm, friendliness and professionalism. The scones and jam were also much appreciated!

In the afternoon we announced the winner of the Cara "Quilt A Poem" Competition in Bailieborough Library where the quilts involved, the work of Mary Halligan were hanging. Having only previously seen the quilts on the internet everyone was impressed by their physical presence.

Four of the short listed poets attended, from Dublin, Fermanagh, Cork and London. They read their poems and LitLab members read the other shortlisted poems. I spoke of the experience of judging, what I was entranced by in the poems and made a short comment on each poem.

The competition winner was Annette Skade from West Cork for her poem Wedding Quilt. Well done Annette! She won the Cork Literary Review Poetry Manuscript Competition in 2012 and her winning collection, Thimblerig, has been published by Bradshaw Books. Above: Annette with LitLab chair, Paddy Halligan and the competition judge.

The final event was the Poetry by Candlelight readings in the Wesleyan Chapel. Another wonderful atmospheric venue with a great audience of local and a group who has traveled from Kells and some fine musicians who entertained the gathering crowd.

The three readers, Heather Brett, Rebecca O'Connor and Noel Monahan, pictured above, were polished performer who delivered their well-crafted work with great assurance and the audience enjoyed the event greatly.

So that's it! Thanks to all who helped, to Poetry Ireland who funded readings, to the sponsors especially Cara Pharmacy and Beauty who sponsored the competition prize and well done LitLab. Some members are even talking about next year's festival already!