Notable award for school poets

NORTH Parramatta’s Redeemer Baptist School has won the prestigious Dorothea Mackellar Poetry Society school’s award. Year three student Catherine Young also managed to pick-up an individual award for her expressive and intimate poem called Sugar Glider.

Judges of the awards selected Redeemer for the school’s award because standard of entries overall were the highest. Principal Jonathan Cannon said students got more out of their curriculum experiences when they were given an opportunity to showcase their work.

‘‘The goal of producing a work of the highest quality to be judged against exacting standards and compared with exceptional talent from students around the country really does inspire an extraordinary effort from the students,’’ Mr Cannon said.

The Dorothea Mackellar Poetry Society project officer Helen Green congratulated the school, the administration, the teachers and particularly the students who submitted work of such a high quality.

‘‘It is a fabulous result of which they can be very proud and we look forward to next year’s competition and more extraordinary poems,’’ she said

Catherine Young’s winning poem: 

Sugar Glider

Stretching pockets of skin,
Grey soft fur,
Like down.
Small leathery nose,
Twitching.

Scampering, leaping,
Then glides
On its parachute skin.
Swooshing, grabbing
The bark,
Four feet dragging,
Safe.

Cautiously then swift,
Strongly landing and
Dashingly through the wind.
Near the clouds.

At the touch of dark,
In the dusky night,
Joyful!