Spectator competition winners: the pleasures of bad poetry

In Competition No. 3167 you were invited to submit a rhymed poem that is leadenly prosaic in tone and content.

When it comes to the joys of bad poetry, McGonagall tends to steal the show. But I also have a soft spot for Amanda McKittrick Ros, whose novels — and verse — provide passages of inadvertent hilarity to rival the worst of Bulwer Lytton (eyes are described as ‘globes of glare’; alcohol is the ‘powerful monster of mangled might’).

An honourable mention goes to George Simmers for his Wordsworthian makeover — ‘I don’t think anywhere could be more pleasant!/ Frankly, you’d have to be boring to pass by…’ — and to Richard Spencer and Janey Wilks. The winners earn £30 each.

The fields behind my cottage stretchLike rectangles of greenWhere grow such plants as chard and vetchTo make a vivid scene. I muse upon it hour by hour,Such healthy food for thought.Not by the classroom but the powerOf Nature we are taught. Thus