Dawn Gorman believes poetry should be everywhere - puts it on beermats, uses it to
work with people with memory loss, facilitates writing workshops, organises poetry
events and runs international poetry competitions. She is widely published, and has
performed in New York, Paris, London - and lots of smaller places in between.

“Poetry isn't a profession, it's a way of life. It's an empty basket;
you put your life into it and make something out of that.” Mary Oliver

Bradford on Avon Fringe Festival Poetry Competition 2011

First

Peter Wyton,

Silverback Snack

Second

Stephen Payne,

O.S.

Third

Graham Burchell,

Drifting

Shortlisted Entry

Bev Hewlett,

Belongings

Claire Coleman,

Recipe

BA15 Postcode Area Special Award

Bob Steel,

The Mirror

Drifting

by Graham Burchell

The shadow of a floating leaf rides
silt and gravel in the brook
without disturbing a grain, better
than a drag of silk. It's lazy:
summer is; the water warmed
because it has no depth.

Rain is a memory. I imagine
that heart-shaped shadow as fingers,
her fingers and hers and hers - slow
loving, lightest touch, the furthest
back in time barely remembered,
like the soft rock of all our childhoods,
washed away.

Judge's Comments - Dawn Gorman

This short poem is like a meditation, its images producing a soporific effect on the reader, and, although apparently light and gentle ("floating leaf", "heart-shaped shadow") have their own hypnotic power. The penultimate line, "soft rock of all our childhoods" is very memorable.