How to write a prize poem? “There is no formula for winning,” says the award-winning poet who will soon be judging the Autumn Voices Over 70 Poetry Competition.

She can’t remember a time

before she knew to be careful.

No-one told her. She knew.

Woman Made of Glass: AC Clarke

Anne Clarke, a Glasgow-based poet whose author name is AC Clarke, clearly does know how to win.   Woman Made of Glass (reproduced in full below) is a prize-winning poem which received the 2011 Grey Hen Award, a competition for women over 60. It adds to her list of awards  – others include the Royal Literary Fund Mentoring Scheme (2005), the Petra Kenney Award (2005) and the Brownsbank International Poetry Competition ( 2007) – and the poem catches the eye with a sometimes startling clarity of words and images.

She saw a glass frog once, its guts

clustered in its belly like pale grapes,

its small heart pittering:

“The best poems will take you by surprise every time.” writes AC Clarke in her advice to entrants for the Autumn Voices competition (entries are to be in by 30 July).

The poetry is in the humanity

Elsewhere she acknowledges her own personal fascination with the human body and human psyche. There’s human connection too. An active member of Scottish Pen, AC Clarke has worked with refugees and asylum seekers on translation projects. As mentor and makar (she was the ‘Makar’ for the Federation of Writers (Scotland) 2007-2008) she also stresses the importance of the meaning of words.

So her advice to applicants is not just to write from the heart but to check the sense and sound of the words: read them aloud.

There is another obvious requirement for this competition. Applicants must be over 70. (See HERE for the other rules of entry)

Both Grey Hen, which was set up by Joy Howard in 2007, and Autumn Voices, launched in May 2017, set out to celebrate the creative work of older writers.

Autumn Voices The Book

“You don’t have to be old to contribute,” writes the founder Robin Lloyd-Jones, aged 82, in his words of welcome to the Autumn Voices blog. “although a little insider knowledge is often useful. Initially, the focus will be mainly on writing, but I plan to expand beyond that later.”

A society that is better for older people is better for people of all ages. To address the problems and the opportunities of the elderly, as does Autumn Voices, is to benefit the welfare of our society as a whole. Robin Lloyd-Jones: Autumn Voices The Book

He has touched a spot. The project as a whole has enthusiastic support from Lapidus, ‘writing for wellbeing’, and Luminate, Scotland’s Festival of Creative Ageing. Perhaps not surprisingly The Autumn Voices Book Launch  attracted sell out crowds to events in Glasgow and Edinburgh in June this year. The book is based on twenty interviews with Scottish writers over seventy still actively writing. An impressive line up – to pick a few names (almost) at random, writers include Diana Hendry, Richard Holloway, Jenni Calder, James Kelman, Bernard MacLaverty – ensured the stockpile of copies sold out at both Blackwells and Waterstones.

The poetry prize money – first prize £250, second £100, third £50 – is funded by Creative Scotland. Entries must be in by Monday 30 July. “I hope that gives your readers time to send me something,” says Robin Lloyd-Jones. “I’ll look forward to reading them,” adds the judge. For more information see Autumn Voices Over 70 Poetry Competition.

So to Woman Made of Glass. Reproduced here with kind permission of the author, it is published in AC Clarke’s fourth collection In The Margin (Cinnamon Press 2015).

WOMAN MADE OF GLASS

She can’t remember a time

before she knew to be careful.

No-one told her. She knew.

 

Her mother used to squeeze her hand so tight

she felt it crack. She’s never risked touch since,

spent childhood dodging

 

the heavy arms of aunts,

washing the smears

of fishmouth kisses from her skin.

 

She saw a glass frog once, its guts

clustered in its belly like pale grapes,

its small heart pittering:

 

took to covering herself –

high collars, sleeves to wrists,

thick tights. Like an old maid

said her mother. No boyfriends yet?

the aunts would dig. Afraid of heat

she’d hurry past lovers fused

 

mouth to mouth in doorways,

likes cool places still,

country churches on weekday afternoons,

 

the saints in the windows filtering light

through sightless eyes.

Old glass is her favourite: its pieced

 

stories jewel-bright, simple, remote

as fairy-tale. Does she notice

how sometimes it bulges towards the base

 

thick and opaque, as if all these years

it’s been sneaking out of the leaden cames,

slipped down, let itself go?

A C Clarke

Autumn Voices The Book, £12.99 is available from Playspace Publications 

Featured Image: You Know taken by Fay Young on Woodland Walk of art workshop installations at Alnwick Castle, Northumberland.