In Competition 2646 you were invited to submit a poem that might have been included in T.S. Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Dogs.
Many of you followed Eliot’s lead and used long lines, so space is limited. I will pause only briefly, then, to commend this week’s stellar runners-up — Frank Osen, Brian Murdoch, George Simmers, Martin Elster and Shirley Curran — before handing you over to the worthy winners, printed below. They get £30 each; Bill Greenwell nabs the bonus fiver.
Barker is a guard-dog, and a hard dog,
watching prowlers,
And some suppose his eyes are closed, and that
he’s deep in slumber,
But though he is a sentinel, he’s a gentleman of
growlers,
And nods you through politely if he knows
your name and number —
The burglars call him Cerberus as at the gates
to Hades:
They tiptoe past him softly in their stockings
and their slippers.
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