Spectator competition: Andrew Marvell’s coy mistress has her say (plus: rock star novelists)

The invitation to step into the shoes of Andrew Marvell’s coy mistress attracted a jumbo entry. Clearly lots of you think it’s high time she had her say. But you weren’t the first to pipe up on her behalf. Marvell’s seductive overtures failed to persuade the Australian (male) poet A.D. Hope. Here’s an extract from his blistering reply, ‘His Coy Mistress to Mr Marvell’, published in 1978:

Had you addressed me in such terms And prattled less of graves and worms, I might, who knows, have warmed to you; But, as things stand, must bid adieu

The contemporary American poet Annie Finch wasn’t having any of it either. Her equally sharp riposte begins: ‘Sir, I am not a bird of prey:/ a Lady does not seize the day.’ Your contributions were funny and satisfyingly inventive — Philip Roe, Nick Grace, Martin John, John O’Byrne and Stanley McDermott III were especially good. The winners, printed below, earn £25 each and Robert Schechter snaffles the extra fiver.

Robert Schechter Were you but Earth’s last-standing man I might agree that life’s short span, Combined with all you’ve rightly said Regarding how we’ll soon be dead, Would be persuasive we should screw.