Sue Cardwell and I (I am Cricketjeff) are partners in rhyme, and we are both rhymers!
We both write in rhyme most of the time and enjoy reading other rhyming poetry.
We feel that rhymers don’t always get the exposure they should on AP so we want to encourage you all to write in rhyme.
Good rhyming poetry uses a steady rhyming pattern and should flow like flaming brandy over a perfect Christmas pudding. To walk off with the gold that is all you will have to produce,, don't think we will be fooled because you put some line breaks and assonances in your prose.
To promote good rhyming poetry, Sue has put up 10,000 points for a series of contests to find the best rhyming poets on AP.
Since then with donations from PassionsPromise, Dragon Tamer and a range of others who wish to remain anonymous the prize fund has topped 20,000 points.
We have now reached the .......
GRAND FINALE
============
To part one of our extravaganza.
The winner of this round can consider themselves the "Rhyming Bard" of AP. They will have composed the "best" new poem by any of our now very large community of poets, 67 poets have collected prizes from us.
Next every poem entered in every round has been carefully read, more than once and we are selecting a "best overall poem" from the contests. I had thought that the overall winner would already have a gold, but circumstances have now made that not certain. The best poems will be invited into a special contest where we will reward them.
Also every prizewinner, whatever the colour, has been accumulating points towards the title of "Best All-Round Rhyming poet on AP", it will be immediately apparent to all of you that actually means "Best All-Round Poet Alive". We do currently have a leader slightly ahead of the pack but following the leader are six poets that are too close to separate. There are enough points in this the double point scoring Finale for seven poets to fight over second place and down.
Finally all the main prize winners will be invited into a special contest after these have finished. This will be for a very large prize and a lot of kudos no doubt!
Back to the main series:-
We started with a 2000 point challenge to write the best Christmas poem on the site, and are moving through 8 more contests to a grand finale, with a 5000 point contest for new writes.
You may enter as few or as many contests as you wish.
If you can RHYME and SCAN these contests are for you
Contest 1 Christmas 2000 points Won by Emile, Soul Catcher and Ronnica (Gold Silver Bronze)
Contest 2 Children’s 1000 points Won by Soul Catcher, Sultan and AliceinPoetryLand
Contest 3 Nature 1000 points Won by jimmy20johns, Amera and Emile
Contest 4 Love! 1250 points Won by Dalaney, ecrivain01 and Amera
Contest 5 Fantasy 1500 points Won by Legend, ecrivain01 and Amera
Contest 6 Sensual 1500 points Won by Sultan, Amera and ecrivain01
Contest 7 Humour 1500 points Won by Amera, PerVirtuousAllen and Mr Doug
Contest 8 Sad/Nostalgia 1500 points Won by Amera, Legend and Potanical
So many entries we have split Round 9 in two. No more than one entry in each please.
Contest 9 Feelings 1500 points Won by Sonja, Legend and Jimmy20Johns
Contest 9a Feelings 1500 points Won by Amera, Ecrivain01 and Cinnarry
=======================================
Contest 10 GRAND FINALE 5000 points
=======================================
Each will be a separate contest, so please only post poems pertaining to the subject of that contest.
We will endeavour to interpret the themes quite widely.
Our aim is to see as much really GOOD rhyming poetry as we can.
We encourage you to read other entries and if you comment in rhyme, Jeff will be giving away bonus prizes as we go!
Rhyming poetry only!!!
======================
Rhyming here means at least end rhyme and organised rhyming pattern, poetry means it flows!
Please don't enter poetry in another form and message me that I don't understand the word rhyme when I disqualify you.
END RHYME IN AN ORGANISED SCHEME!!!!
Not any particular form but end rhyme and flow are needed.
To stand a chance of winning you will need excellent rhyme, beautiful flow and other poetical devices will help too. HOWEVER (and two or three entrants have commented on the winners) the best poem in the judges opinions will win, not the best written poem, the most difficult poem or the cleverest poem. The poem that feels best to the judges, it will have to have nearly faultless rhyme and flow, but after that content will count.
We want wonderful rhyme and flow AND a story, or at any rate test, that we want to read.
We are judging all rounds on our own feelings about each poem. We are not implying that the winners are better than those who don't make the final what we are saying is the winners have written poems that appeal most to two inveterate rhymers. Look at the winners of the previous rounds if you want clues as to how to win I would suggest something along the lines of a poem with as near to perfect end rhyme as you can get (if you think your accent differs from two judges from Southern England suggest how any words you think could vary should be pronounced in your poem), wonderful flow, this means partly getting your syllable counts right but mainly read the poem out loud and listen to the result! And pour passion into the content, we are both somewhat sentimental!
For a guide on what we like please read this column
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTEST NUMBER 10
==================
The FINALE
==================
You can use the picture Sue has chosen to illustrate your poem or one of your own but no picture is necessary. Please try to make the poems readable!
No themes this time, feel free to write to any of our previous themes or to one of your own. This time only new-writes are allowed.
Gold will win 2500 points and a trophy and be crowned Bard of AP.
Silver 1500 points and a trophy and be seen to be better than all bar one of AP's great and good.
Bronze 1000 points and a trophy and be the third best poet alive (well fifth best excluding us!).
HM’s and HMs plus points will be added depending on the quality of the entry and will leave us feeling warm and glowing.
The rest will simply leave us.
Rules.
The usual site rules apply.
Please label all poems appropriately. No restrictions on material but we both dislike cutting, self harm etc poetry and we really want as many poets as possible to see the winners.
All the best -- Now Get Rhyming
We are bound to get over 50 entries so we will restrict all poets to a Maximum of TWO entries. This is to give us more time to read the others properly.
We will not give more than one major prize to any poet.
Non-rhyming poetry will be DQ'd at once, good poets can read!
We both write in rhyme most of the time and enjoy reading other rhyming poetry.
We feel that rhymers don’t always get the exposure they should on AP so we want to encourage you all to write in rhyme.
Good rhyming poetry uses a steady rhyming pattern and should flow like flaming brandy over a perfect Christmas pudding. To walk off with the gold that is all you will have to produce,, don't think we will be fooled because you put some line breaks and assonances in your prose.
To promote good rhyming poetry, Sue has put up 10,000 points for a series of contests to find the best rhyming poets on AP.
Since then with donations from PassionsPromise, Dragon Tamer and a range of others who wish to remain anonymous the prize fund has topped 20,000 points.
We have now reached the .......
GRAND FINALE
============
To part one of our extravaganza.
The winner of this round can consider themselves the "Rhyming Bard" of AP. They will have composed the "best" new poem by any of our now very large community of poets, 67 poets have collected prizes from us.
Next every poem entered in every round has been carefully read, more than once and we are selecting a "best overall poem" from the contests. I had thought that the overall winner would already have a gold, but circumstances have now made that not certain. The best poems will be invited into a special contest where we will reward them.
Also every prizewinner, whatever the colour, has been accumulating points towards the title of "Best All-Round Rhyming poet on AP", it will be immediately apparent to all of you that actually means "Best All-Round Poet Alive". We do currently have a leader slightly ahead of the pack but following the leader are six poets that are too close to separate. There are enough points in this the double point scoring Finale for seven poets to fight over second place and down.
Finally all the main prize winners will be invited into a special contest after these have finished. This will be for a very large prize and a lot of kudos no doubt!
Back to the main series:-
We started with a 2000 point challenge to write the best Christmas poem on the site, and are moving through 8 more contests to a grand finale, with a 5000 point contest for new writes.
You may enter as few or as many contests as you wish.
If you can RHYME and SCAN these contests are for you
Contest 1 Christmas 2000 points Won by Emile, Soul Catcher and Ronnica (Gold Silver Bronze)
Contest 2 Children’s 1000 points Won by Soul Catcher, Sultan and AliceinPoetryLand
Contest 3 Nature 1000 points Won by jimmy20johns, Amera and Emile
Contest 4 Love! 1250 points Won by Dalaney, ecrivain01 and Amera
Contest 5 Fantasy 1500 points Won by Legend, ecrivain01 and Amera
Contest 6 Sensual 1500 points Won by Sultan, Amera and ecrivain01
Contest 7 Humour 1500 points Won by Amera, PerVirtuousAllen and Mr Doug
Contest 8 Sad/Nostalgia 1500 points Won by Amera, Legend and Potanical
So many entries we have split Round 9 in two. No more than one entry in each please.
Contest 9 Feelings 1500 points Won by Sonja, Legend and Jimmy20Johns
Contest 9a Feelings 1500 points Won by Amera, Ecrivain01 and Cinnarry
=======================================
Contest 10 GRAND FINALE 5000 points
=======================================
Each will be a separate contest, so please only post poems pertaining to the subject of that contest.
We will endeavour to interpret the themes quite widely.
Our aim is to see as much really GOOD rhyming poetry as we can.
We encourage you to read other entries and if you comment in rhyme, Jeff will be giving away bonus prizes as we go!
Rhyming poetry only!!!
======================
Rhyming here means at least end rhyme and organised rhyming pattern, poetry means it flows!
Please don't enter poetry in another form and message me that I don't understand the word rhyme when I disqualify you.
END RHYME IN AN ORGANISED SCHEME!!!!
Not any particular form but end rhyme and flow are needed.
To stand a chance of winning you will need excellent rhyme, beautiful flow and other poetical devices will help too. HOWEVER (and two or three entrants have commented on the winners) the best poem in the judges opinions will win, not the best written poem, the most difficult poem or the cleverest poem. The poem that feels best to the judges, it will have to have nearly faultless rhyme and flow, but after that content will count.
We want wonderful rhyme and flow AND a story, or at any rate test, that we want to read.
We are judging all rounds on our own feelings about each poem. We are not implying that the winners are better than those who don't make the final what we are saying is the winners have written poems that appeal most to two inveterate rhymers. Look at the winners of the previous rounds if you want clues as to how to win I would suggest something along the lines of a poem with as near to perfect end rhyme as you can get (if you think your accent differs from two judges from Southern England suggest how any words you think could vary should be pronounced in your poem), wonderful flow, this means partly getting your syllable counts right but mainly read the poem out loud and listen to the result! And pour passion into the content, we are both somewhat sentimental!
For a guide on what we like please read this column
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTEST NUMBER 10
==================
The FINALE
==================
You can use the picture Sue has chosen to illustrate your poem or one of your own but no picture is necessary. Please try to make the poems readable!
No themes this time, feel free to write to any of our previous themes or to one of your own. This time only new-writes are allowed.
Gold will win 2500 points and a trophy and be crowned Bard of AP.
Silver 1500 points and a trophy and be seen to be better than all bar one of AP's great and good.
Bronze 1000 points and a trophy and be the third best poet alive (well fifth best excluding us!).
HM’s and HMs plus points will be added depending on the quality of the entry and will leave us feeling warm and glowing.
The rest will simply leave us.
Rules.
The usual site rules apply.
Please label all poems appropriately. No restrictions on material but we both dislike cutting, self harm etc poetry and we really want as many poets as possible to see the winners.
All the best -- Now Get Rhyming
We are bound to get over 50 entries so we will restrict all poets to a Maximum of TWO entries. This is to give us more time to read the others properly.
We will not give more than one major prize to any poet.
Non-rhyming poetry will be DQ'd at once, good poets can read!
Contest is Over
- Contest was judged on February 12
- Rewards: Gold: 2500, Silver: 1500, Bronze: 1000, Honorable mention: 20 people
- Final notes: First thing to say is thanks to Sue! Sue Cardwell started these with my assistance because we wanted to find some people writing good rhyming poetry that anyone would enjoy reading. Things started slowly but we have seen a steady growth in quality and size of entry.
The standard was such that in the Finale only 2 poems were entered that did not meet what appeared in the early rounds to be an exacting standard for finallists.
The Finale has been of a staggering standard, 60 fresh writes, 58 finallists, and two of the best poems in the series in the top two spots.
Amera's winning poem is a stunningly beautiful and perfectly crafted, internally-rhymed sonnet, EarthToJim picks up silver with a modern sea shanty and Legend steals yet another cup and our hearts.
The HMs have been judged to an exacting standard and restricted to 20.
Looking back over the series we have seen stunning poetry from many great poets.
We have given prizes to 69 poets, 11 golds, silvers and bronzes, the rest HMs.Adding all the results from the series we get the following top 10 (11 people owing to a tie for 8th)
1 Amera
2 Legend
3 ecrivain01
4 Emile
Soul Catcher
5 jimmy20johns
6 Gwenevere
passim
8 LadyDementia
mimiagatha
Sonja
These will all be invitited to submit their names in a contest to pick up an appropriate cup as overall rhyming champions of AP
The top 10 poems in our opinion will be invited into another contest for the best poem of the series.
The top 35 poets overall are to be invited into a follow up contest, before which the remaining prize winners will be invited to compete to join them.
Thanks to all of you Sue and I will greatly miss the excitement each morning of coming down to see what marvellous new entries are there. On the other hand we hope very much that someone else will do something similar in the near future so we can take part!
We will be back to do it all again later in the year!
Thanks again to all and keep writing rhyme!
Jeff and Sue
Contest Winners
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It's on this tramp steamer that I, a day dreamer,
am changing from child to man.• Commented on by judge. [remove] -
• Commented on by judge. [remove]
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The thing about rhyme that I find all the time
Is it clears out the sinuses fast• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
On the tip of a kiss ...by Susan E. Pennycuff 16 lines, 21 comments, on Jan 27 10:51 PM. In Love, Romance, Noguest
Honorable winner
• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
The ocean whispers softly and reaches out to me
I feel destiny calling with such intensity• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
by LadyDementia 24 lines, 19 comments, on Jan 21 10:42 AM. In Contest, Fantasy, Weird
Honorable winner• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
~oOo~• Viewed by judge. [remove]
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Cocooned in meditation, my eager sail unfurls.
My ocean’s spraying beads, like champagne pearlsby passim 32 lines, 10 comments, on Jan 30 4:45 AM. In Spiritual. Meditation, Personal. Reward
Honorable winner
• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
Sweet nectar of loves blossom, passions scent. Petals spread softly over sheets present,• Viewed by judge. [remove]
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You left just a boy so innocent and pure
You came back a man tainted, obscure• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
As it identifies it's season...
the ascertainment has a reason....• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
He iss my king I am his queen,
this fact you all should know,• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
My family has such strong beliefs
About meanings of dreams• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
As I walked along a country road
I heard a meadowlark sing• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
I built myself a castle in the sand
without the luxury of a steady hand.• Viewed by judge. [remove] -
Spring is a new birth With all it has it is worth• Viewed by judge. [remove]
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by RuthKephart 25 lines, 5 comments, on Jan 28 8:40 PM• Commented on by judge. [remove]
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He lived alone my brother, he’d never taken a wife in his house a painting hung, he said it was his life,• Commented on by judge. [remove]
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In the land of Cimmeria things are far scarier• Commented on by judge. [remove]
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I want this poem to be perfect,
with measured rhythm and words that rhymeby HeavensDaughter 14 lines, 7 comments, on Feb 11 11:27 AM. In Humor• Commented on by judge. [remove] -
How can I love you You hate me alreadyby musicluvahh 20 lines, 8 comments, on Feb 11 7:02 AM• Commented on by judge. [remove]
Gold trophy winner
Silver trophy winner
Bronze trophy winner
Entries [46]
1 - 46 of 46
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You have to concentrate and indicate
the thoughts of your mindby thebuffalo 79 lines, 1 comment, on Feb 10 1:43 PM• Commented on by judge.
Add a comment
Comments
1 - 18 of 18
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What if I compose an Interlocking Rubáiyát with a beginning, middle and end rhyme. Will that be too difficult a form to receive a worthy comment?
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Sue and I both love Rubaiyats, so we would be delighted with it.
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I'm just pointing out that I posted 5 days ago and my poem has not been read, even though ones after it has. I'm guessing it was accidently skipped over so I just wanted to point out that it is there.
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Oh, the name of it is Sandcastles.
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I made some changes to the poem that I entered, "In The Willows Tonight"...just wanted to let you know.
Ruth -
Good luck with this round of rhyme and verse
Whilst I have no wish to sound a tad terse
You say that the accolade of winning will denote
An award of the best all round rhyming poet alive
How could that be technically correct
When not all rhymers alive have entered herein
This comment is not meant to cause disaffect
Nor I hope is viewed as a thought of sin
Just sharing a perspective after a rhyming poets have shared with me their sadness at not standing a chance of wearing this crown, these contests have been inspirational to rhymers but at the end of the day those that lose have not lost,as you say, because their poem wasn't good enough but because you prefer those you choose to win, in fact, just like every other contest holder.So, everyone is a winner in your eyes and that is nice to read that level of encouragement for there is indeed a huge variety within the levels of compromized and uncompromized rhyme.
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Best rhyming poet on AP
All folk agree, of course, is me
But I can't enter this I fear.
You see I am a a judge this year
All other rhymers have a chance.
To come and join this merry dance.
Greatest poet has to win,
Not entering - a mortal sin!
Everyone is welcome to enter and in my eyes anyone who impresses us in the company of poets who have entered is a clear winner.
We have seen about 700 poems from a couple of hundred poets. There are two or three good rhymers who haven't entered but I think it is a fair enough tagline. Everyone who enters has a chance to win.
But much much much more important
Is it is fun :-)
Go on!
Give it a go
you know you want to
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Thankyou for the invite to try
Alas alack and with a sigh
I could not enter just for fun
My rhyme is a crime
And am aware of it you see
But 'tis not a sin
For other poets to pen
So good luck to each and everyone
Tallyho and toodlepip
The contest has begun!
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wow..
can't wait for the results..what a great idea..love rhyme..kind of a rhyme snob..hehe..will come back and check later for results..will be bookmarked.. -
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If you like your po-ems to rhyme
Then we have the treat of all time
You could do a lot worse
than stick in a verse
If your meter and flow are sublime
The judges will not look askance
Or lead you a merry old dance
So give it a go
Put your rhyming on show
You know you've a very good chance
Fresh writes you'll need in this round
One or two with the style to astound
So come take your turn
Who knows what you'll learn
When your talents are shown above ground!
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An interesting contest.
I love to write rhyming poetry.
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If I were more on the ball
I'd be rhyming with you all
But afraid I must say
My muse ran away
And never did come when I'd call.
LOVE THIS CONCEPT ...wish I'd have cottoned on much sooner.
Splendid work ...rhyme on!
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Hmm...personally I found the bronze winner more deserving of the gold but well...congrats to all the winners and thanx for hosting this long going series
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Thank you
Thank you Sue and jeff for the hm and and to both of you for taking the time to run these contests for us all. well done to all the winners best wishes to everyone Brian. -
well indeed as always another end to another contest. COngratulations to all winners and best wishes to all in future endeavors.
COngrats once again to Amera on Gold.
Passions. -
Congratulations to all winners and thanks for HM
~Sonja~
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I looked at your wording sir
You make rhymed poetry sound like a Christmas pudding, truly. May I recommend some of the rhymed poetry of Nobel Laureate, WB Yeats.
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You received a great turnout. There are plenty of Rhymers on this site. Good ones too. Thanks for hosting such a contest. I have no poetic preference. I love all forms of poetry. Congratulations to all the winners here!
Much Love ♥
Renee
Adding your comment:
1 - 18 of 18
