I thought I had a fighting chance. A local poem

about a long-lost railway line. But I forgot

that for most folk, especially in Northumberland,

a poem must rhyme. There were some

accidental rhymes there, but not enough, it seems.

 

Unplaced in a field of six. I even included

some dialect words, but maybe in the wrong order.

I guess they somehow spotted I was a southerner.

Luckily my wife’s first prizes for her landscape

collage and painted rock maintained the family honour.

 

Bitter, moi? Versification’s all a matter of taste.

There really are no firsts, seconds or thirds.

I note that in ‘Show Saturday’ Larkin

doesn’t mention whether he entered his poetry.  

 

But if I had won? Would I have run a lap

of triumph around the main arena, past

the sheep and alpacas, junior wrestlers,

and steamroller? Well, I might have done.