Poetry Slammers Jacqui and Robyn

Poetry Slam host Miles Merril entertained the audience with his sound effects and poetry

Winter by Megan Roweth

Warm woolly jumpers covered in snow,

Bonfires burning bright,

Frosty white, cold at night,

Heaters a burning light.

Reading Banjo by the fire,

Pretty soon I start to tire,

Trickling away like sand and dirt through your fingers.

(Written & performed by Megan at Banjo Paterson Festival Poetry Slam, reproduced here with permission)

We opened up our Banjo Paterson Festival Poetry Slam to people of all ages on Saturday afternoon at the CWA Hall. Spoken word artist and host Miles Merrill performed his own brand of poetry for the fantastic audience who thoroughly enjoyed the spirit of the competition.

Four performers bravely took to the stage – Jason, Megan, Jacqui and Robyn – and impressed the judges chosen from the audience with their wonderful performances. The scores were very close – Jason was placed 4th with “Castlereagh”, Jacqui was 3rd with a poem about Spiders, Megan came 2nd with “Winter” and Robyn took out first place with her amusing poem about shopping. In a wonderful gesture, Robyn gave her prize of a $100 gift voucher to Megan, aged 6 years, for her standout original performance on the day.  The crowd burst into loud applause for this act of kindness. Jacqui also entertained everyone with a spontaneous second performance called “Cockroaches” which involved audience participation and had everyone laughing. Thank you both performers and audience for a great afternoon of entertainment.

Congratulations to all those wordsmiths who entered the inaugural River Words Poetry Competition as part of the Kalari River Arts Festival held on the weekend. The winning entries are now on display at Forbes Library. The winners are:

Category Primary School Winners – the prize of  $100 each:

Forbes Kindergarten student Fyn Harrison (pictured above) – The Big Carp and Orange Year 6 student Jeremy Elliott – Little Sally in the Valley

Category Secondary School – Winner – the prize of $100:

Bathurst Year 7 student Georgia Butt – Harvest Time

Highly Commended: Bathurst Year 7 student Felix McClymont – The Crystal River and Bathurst Year 8 student Matthew Vance – River Loss

Category Adult – the prize of $100:

Keith Rawsthorne, of Forbes – Kalari- My River (pictured below)

Highly Commended to Lee Reynolds, of Forbes – The Lachlan River (pictured below).

Get writing. There is still time to get your entries in. Let the river inspire your poetry in this competition. Poems will go on display at Forbes Library and winning entries will be read at the Kalari-Lachlan River Arts Festival. The Festival is a celebration of country, creativity and resilience on the Kalari-Lachlan River, Forbes.

There are three sections Primary, and Secondary students, and Adults with a $100 prize offered to winners in each category.

Each poem must include the word “river”, include a title, be presented on one side of an A4-sized sheet of paper. Poetry is limited to a maximum of 30 lines.

Judging will take place by a Central West Libraries judging panel including the Central West Writers’ Centre Coordinator.

Entry is free but please attach an entry form to your poem. Entry forms are available from Forbes Library or download from Central West Libraries website www.cwl.nsw.gov.au homepage. Entries must be sent to River Words, Central West Libraries PO Box 35 ORANGE NSW 2800. The competition closes on the last mail, Monday 21st October 2013.For more details about festival events go to www.riverartsfestival.org.au

It’s Banjo’s birthday (Sunday 17th February) and to celebrate we are announcing the call for entries in the Banjo Paterson Writing Awards.  Poet, solicitor, journalist, war correspondent and ballad writer Andrew Barton “Banjo” Paterson (1864 – 1941) was born near Orange and each year the Central West Writers’ Centre, in conjunction with Central West Libraries, The Central Western Daily and ABC Central West Radio announce the call for entries in the Banjo Paterson Writing Awards.

There are four categories:

Short Story
Open Poetry
Bush Poetry and
ABC Central West Radio Children’s Writing Awards for writing by children aged 16 years and under

2013 Banjo Paterson Writing Awards Entry Form 

Listen to ABC Local Radio for details about their Floriade Haiku Competition.

A “Haiku” is a short poem “that captures the essence of a brief, transient moment in one's life and the universe.”

Haiku is one of the oldest forms of poetry that started in Japan. Your challenge for this competition is to come up with the best choice of words to capture the essence of Spring.

Haiku poems follow a pattern. There are 5 syllables in the first line, 7 in the second and 5 again the last line.

Here is an example:

Birds hatched and chirping

Trees and flowers are blooming

New life is now here

This one is written by Bailey on the Creative Writing Now website.

Listen to ABC Local Radio in the mornings for all the competition details and email your entries by Friday 16 September to [email protected] to be in the running for a great prize to Canberra's Floriade. Good Luck!