This year we have a chosen five words from the poem
Las Moscas ('Flies') by
the Spanish poet Antonio Machado which you can read below. All you have to do
is write a poem which includes the five words and send it to us before
midnight on 21 August, National Poetry Day.
We will award prizes for the
Best Poem and the
Best Poem by Under-16s. The winners will receive books courtesy of
Landing Press and The Cuba Press (see below). In addition the winning poems will
be translated into Spanish and published on the Spanish version of the project
Palabras Prestadas.
And the five words are presented by Charles Olsen…
(If for some reason you cannot see or hear the words in
the video you will find them at the bottom of this post.)
The rules:
– Note: This year the only exception is that the word 'fly' is the animal and
not a verb.
– The theme is up to you.
– The poem must include the five words.
– The words can be in any order.
– You may change the tense of verbs and change between plural and singular.
– Maximum length 200 words.
– Entry is free and open to all NZ citizens and residents.
– Only one poem per person.
– Poems by under-16s must also include the age of the poet. We would prefer
parents or teachers to send the poem on the child's behalf.
– FOR TEACHERS: You are very welcome to get your classes to participate, but
please help us out by only sending in a selection of up to 10 of the best
poems from your students. We have prepared a
lesson plan for teachers.
– Participation means you allow us to reproduce your poem on Given Words.
– The deadline for entry is
midnight on 21 August 2019.
Submit your poem by email
including your full name and town of residence to:
nzgivenwords@gmail.com
To receive updates about the competition please
subscribe to our newsletter here. We only send emails related with this competition and you can easily opt out
at any time.
Winning poems will be selected by
Charles Olsen,
Mikaela Nyman and
Jordan Jace.
Mikaela Nyman is a Kiwi Finn born on the Åland Islands in Finland and
living in New Zealand. Four years in Vanuatu, a sister’s death and a cyclone (TC
Pam in 2015) changed her life. Her PhD research focuses on creative writing,
rhetorical alliance and Ni-Vanuatu women’s voices. Her first novel
Sado (2020) is
set in Vanuatu. Her first poetry collection,
När vändkrets läggs mot vändkrets, was published in Finland in 2019 and
is nominated for the
Nordic Council Literature Prize 2020. It connects the islands of her heart: the Åland Islands, Vanuatu and New
Zealand. Currently she is collaborating with Ni-Vanuatu writers and editing
Sista Stanap Strong: A Vanuatu Women’s Anthology (forthcoming) to
commemorate Vanuatu’s 40th independence anniversary.
Jordan Jace is a writer based in Los Angeles and will begin their MFA in
Poetry at Brown University in the Fall of 2020. A student of abolitionism, their
work has been published with
Freedom Arts Press,
Cosmonauts Avenue, and The Recluse, a publication put out by the Poetry Project. They have words
forthcoming in Smoke and Mold in September.
Charles Olsen (b. Nelson, 1969) has published two collections of poetry,
Sr Citizen
and
Antípodas. In 2017 he was awarded the XIII distinction
Poetas de Otros Mundos by
the
Fondo Poético Internacional, in Spain, in recognition of the high
quality of his poetic oeuvre. His poetry films have been featured in Moving
Poems, Poetry Film Live, Atticus Review, Blackmail Press and international
poetry film festivals. In 2018 he was awarded the
III Antonio Machado Poetry Residency
in Segovia and Soria and together with the Colombian writer Lilián Pallares he
has received a
Visual Artists Residency
in the Matadero Centre for Contemporary Creation, Madrid, in 2020. He has
contributed essays to the forthcoming
The Poetics of Poetry Film, Bristol: Intellect Books, S. Tremlett (ed).
About the prizes:
The winner of Best Poem will receive My wide white bed by
Trish Harris and Keel & Drift by Adrienne Jansen, courtesy
of
Landing Press
|
The winner of Best Poem by Under-16s will receive
The Ghosts on the Hill by Bill Nagelkerke and
Super spare parts and the nemerons from the twefth quadrant by C.
J. Parker, courtesy of
The Cuba Press
|
And here is Antonio Machado's poem
Las Moscas translated by Charles
Olsen:
Flies
You, long-familiar flies
Inescapable, avaricious,
Everyday housefly, you
bring it all back to me.
Oh, hungry old flies
Eager as April’s bees,
Insistent flies intent
On my baby brow!
Flies of that first tedium
In the family living room
On bright summer afternoons
As I begin to dream!
And in the hated school
Speedy amusing flies
Chased
By a love for that which zooms
—All is flight—, persistent
Buzzing against the windows
On autumnal days…
Flies of all hours,
Of childhood and adolescence
Of my golden youth
Of the second innocence
As one loses all faith,
Of all ages… Dirty flies
Such common things
You’ll never have a decent singer.
I know you have walked
On the colourful toy,
The closed textbook,
The love letter,
The stiff eyelids
Of the dead.
Unavoidable greedy ones
Who neither labour as bees do
Nor sparkle like butterflies,
Tiny, mischievous things
Old friends,
You remind me of it all.
You can read about Antonio Machado on
Poetry Foundation.
(The five words are: letter, childhood, fly (the animal), greedy and dream.)
