Bird on wire: poem’s strange beauty wins national prize
11 May 2011
A poem featuring observations of goldfinches has won the 2011 Christopher Tower Poetry Prize run by Christ Church, one of Oxford University’s largest colleges.
Elizabeth Johnson from Farlingaye High School in Suffolk was presented with the £3,000 first prize for her poem, Wires, at a reception at the House of Commons on Monday.
The judges, Professor David Morley, Director of Writing at Warwick University, Frances Leviston, a poet and alumna of Oxford’s St Hilda’s College and Peter McDonald, Tutor in Poetry at Christ Church, chose the 18-year-old’s submission for “its strange beauty and unforgettable power.”
Francis Leviston added: “The poem’s apparently simple images and statements build into a complex study of the intersection between nature and technology, rendered in precise, impressionistic language.
“Its eerie tone is superbly controlled, while its couplets demonstrate a natural sense of form. The poem is clear, mysterious and disturbing, and the judges felt unanimously that this was a work of real talent."
This is the 11th year of the competition which is open to all 16-18 year olds in full or part-time education. Students from a total of 764 schools and colleges took part this year and of those institutions, 130 sent submissions for the first time.
The competition always has a theme with ‘Simplicity’ the focus this year. The £1,000 second prize went to Jack Westmore from Haberdashers’ Aske’s Hatcham College, London, for his poem Shipbreakers with Abigail Richards of King Edward VI Camp Hill School for Girls in Birmingham winning the £500 third prize for Simple. The students’ schools and colleges also received cash prizes, taking the total amount awarded to £5,800.
Youngsters from 1,096 schools have entered since the competition began in 2000. Its launch followed a bequest to Christ Church for the promotion of poetry writing from college alumnus Christopher Tower.
Previous prize winners include Richard O’Brien, commended in 2008 and now reading English and French at Brasenose College, Oxford, and Annie Katchinska who was second in the 2007 competition. In the same year, Katchinska was a Foyle Young Poet of the Year for the second time. She is currently studying classics at Cambridge.
All the winning poems are on the Tower Poetry website (www.towerpoetry.org.uk) with the authors reading their own poems. More information on the competition and other Tower projects is available from info@towerpoetry.org.uk or by calling 01865 286591.
WIRES by Elizabeth Johnson
Goldfinches wait in lines behind curtains.
One buzzes, others open hinges to the sun.
Each morning, goldfinches appear like obedient husbands.
They are here again. They know who gathers them.
I am trying, slowly, to shut them down forever.
They are all too filled with blistering flame.
On telephone wires, birds meet with brighter rays.
The rifle reddens their hearts
At the window each morning.
Again, I know it is my mechanism to break them.
Their shining cores colour the world,
For a moment.
How they are hurt and yet
Here they return, golden and dancing.