CANYON, Texas (KAMR/KCIT) – These poems should not be compared to a summer day. They are ruder and more contemptuous.
According to an announcement from West Texas A&M University, its 2022 Bad Poetry competition presented by Brick & Elm magazine was scheduled for 6:30 p.m. on March 9 at Legacy Hall, inside the Jack B. Kelley Student Center on the Canyon campus.
“We can’t all be Shakespeare, soaring to Parnassus on wings of golden worms,” said event organizer Matthew Harrison and Wendy and Stanley Marsh 3 Shakespeare’s teacher, “At the Bad Poetry Contest, we let’s celebrate that fact, embracing the goofy poetess in all of us.
The event is open to all, according to WT, and aims to offer “the chance for amateur versifiers to share their clumsy metaphors, mangled meter, inane elegies, vile villanels and other forms of frayed verse and pleasant nonsense”.
Although reading aloud is not required, Brick & Elm editor Jason Boyett advised attendees to bring two or three original poems. For the audience, however, participation and interaction are expected and encouraged.
“Interaction is expected from audience members in the form of laughter, boos, groans or embarrassed silence,” Boyett said, “doubtfully qualified judges will award prizes at the end of the contest, although ‘winning’ This event is not something ‘ll want to, like, mention in good company. Or not at all.
In the past, WT has said the poems have covered topics ranging from love to dental hygiene, from Amarillo’s beauty at sunset to its distinctive smell.
“Mediocre prizes,” said WT, “will be awarded to the best of the worst.”
