First Prize: Damage by Sarah Doyle

Second Prize: My life on a postcard by Dillon Jaxx

Third Prize: Canary Sharon Black

Highly Commended:

• Franz Joseph Pilgimage by Ilse Pedler
• Irish Sabbath by Siobhan Ward 
• After we tell our mummy… by Vanessa Lampert

Commended:

• Prevailing Conditions  Sarah Doyle
• Three Days Helene Demetriades
• After  Helen Overell
• How to write a poem…  Mary Mulholland

Selected:

• The Child Show Charles Mawer
• A year of headlines… Val Ormrod
• Reporter Sharon Black
• Observing the Cell Caroline Gilfillan
• What are little girls made of Elizabeth Barton
• Under an Orange Sky Tim Waller
• Wreck-diving Thea Smiley
• What I didn’t keep Vicci Bentley
• 1970s Boys Vanessa Lampert
• Dog Circus Ilse Pedler
• Teaching my son to play chess AC Clarke
• When David Bowie.. Deborah Finding
• Getting the summer clothes out Lucy Crispin
• The Croime of Spaking Pauline O’Dell
• Surgeons Clare Starling
• Fred’s Kit Diana Pritchard
• This the memory Roger Elkins
• Sink Hole Tim Waller
• Your Name, Beth  Chrissie Dreier
• Disappearing Act  Jane Kite
• Sarah Raven’s Gardening Catalogue  Sylvia Banham
• Migration  Morag Anderson
• After the Storm Siobhan Ward
• Three Ghosts Suzanna Fitzpatrick

Our competition anthology, The Ver Prize 2023, will include all of the above poems and Julia Webb’s report. All those included will receive a copy. Further copies can be ordered by sending a cheque for £4 (plus £1 p&p), made payable to Ver Poets, to 181 Sandridge Road, St Albans, Herts, AL1 4AH.