2025 Competition Results

We are delighted to announce the results of the Ware Poets Open Poetry Competition 2025 judged by Hannah Copley.

Hannah Copley is the author of  Speculum  (Broken Sleep Books, 2021) and  Lapwing (Pavilion Poetry, LUP,  2024).  The latter, which was a Poetry Book Society Summer 2024 Recommendation,  won second prize in the 2024 Laurel Prize and was nominated for the 2024 T.S. Eliot Prize.

Hannah is a poetry editor at the long-running literary magazine  Stand. She also runs a  regular poetry night at the Soho Poly.

She is a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing  at the University of Westminster.

Competition winners

1st prize. Saag Field, Splinter - Zain Rishi (Edinburgh)

2nd prize. Fractals - Sharon Black (Valborgne, France)

3rd prize. Badger Man - Christopher Horton (Wye, Kent)

Sonnet prize. Three Moths - Rency Raquid (Oxford)

Highly commended poems

Magnolia - Sophia Argyris (Kidlington, Oxon)

Three Thoughts in April - Sophia Argyris (Kidlington, Oxon)

Pretty Day - Jo Bratten (London)

I do a workshop on the poetry of household objects - Alison Campbell (Haringey)

Mud Harvesters after The Flood - Maria Castro Dominguez (Canary Islands)

Poem that could just as well be about falling asleep or doing the washing up or listening to almost any song but in this instance happens to be about a trip to the zoo - Jen Feroze (Leigh on Sea)

The Morning Shift at Wetherspoons Begins with Majesty - Ewen Glass (Lincoln)

CONTRABAND - Nicholas Hogg (Leicester)

in some languages sky is the same as heaven - Dillon Jaxx (Bexhill)

The Tongue Factory - Terry Jones (Windsor)

Leftovers - Esther Lay (Wootton by Woodstock, Oxon)

Transitional Hare - Sylvie Jane Lewis (Chichester)

How to write her name in air - Mary Mulholland (London)

Becoming a woman seemed possible - Jackson Phoenix Nash (Chelmsford)

Intro to a Future Cover Letter - Taylor Strickland (Glasgow)

the upness of the buds and the redness - Kay Syrad (Laughton, East Sussex)

the school of light - Laura Thais (Oxford)

Library of Field Notes, Vatnajökull - Jane Thomas (Oxford)

Intimacy - Tim Waller (London)

Our hearty congratulations to all of the above! And a big thank you to our judge, Hannah Copley, and to all the poets who submitted their poems.

The prizewinning poems will be published on this website after our prizegiving event on the evening of Friday, 11 July 2025, at Ware Arts Centre, Kibes Lane, Ware, Herts., SG12 7BS, to which all are welcome. The evening will begin at 8pm and will end at 10pm. Entry prices: £5; £3 for students under 24; Free to ages 18 and under. Free entry for Competition prizewinners and commended poets.

All prizewinning and commended poems will be read at the event, and all will be published in our competition anthology, which will be available at a cover price of £5. If you are unable to attend the event but wish to receive a copy of the anthology, please email your order to the Competition Secretary at warepoetscomp@gmail.com.

Posted on 9 June 2025

Ware Poets Competition

Ware Poets have run a competition for each of the past 25 years, offering poets the hope of success, hope that their way with words will resonate with the judge and reach a wider public in the anthology, maybe even win a cash prize. It offers the judge an opportunity to perform a critical assessment and offer advice.

The competition has become well known and well regarded. It has attracted judges with a high profile in the poetry world, and poems from poets both established and previously unknown have been included in the anthologies. Entries are received from throughout the United Kingdom and abroad. Winning poems are entered for the Forward Prize.

Some copies of previous competition anthologies are still available: please contact the competition secretary for details.

Previous judges

Sophie Hannah

Ken Smith

Anne-Marie Fyfe

Michael Laskey

Mimi Khalvati

Martyn Crucefix

Judi Benson

George Szirtes

Tamar Yoseloff

John Mole

Pat Borthwick

Robert Seatter

Carole Satyamurti

Dean Parkin

Susan Utting

Roddy Lumsden

Carrie Etter

Philip Gross

Hannah Lowe

John Greening

Maggie Butt

Glyn Maxwell

Kim Moore

Jonathan Edwards

Greta Stoddart

Paul Stephenson