A keen eye for observation and a compassionate invitation to belong were evident in the winning entries in the Year 5-6 category for this year’s Student Poetry Competition.
Congratulations to Annette Burger (Harkaway Hills College), Millie Daniel (Woodleigh School) and all of those who received honourable mentions.
The competition, part of the Arts Learning Festival, was open to students from all school sectors, and attracted more than 500 entries.
‘The Old Steam Train’
Like an antique in a shop window.
Fallen off the track long, long ago,
It now lay on its side with only memories of the past.
The train had an aroma of stale smoke,
Its funnel stained black from soot and ashes.
A wheel fallen off,
Lying in grass so long only half the engine could be seen.
No longer any motion,
Or the “toot, toot” of the Old Stream Train
Whistling. Now it lay abandoned,
Its purpose unfulfilled.
By night, a skeleton,
Cold and dark,
As dead and lifeless as the grave,
So still, or so it seemed.
Then a mother bird flies through a broken window,
A worm wiggling within her beak,
To feed her squabbling baby birds,
Filling the air with tunes.
Some things may seem so lifeless,
Yet this Old Steam Train of the past,
Is a body now repurposed,
And Spring blooms within its walls.
‘You Belong’
Written poetry
- Christian Berryman – Year 6, Fitzroy Community School – ‘Cat’
- Chloe Carter – Year 5, Girton Grammar – ‘My Team’
- Maya Chavez – Year 5, Harkaway Hills College – ‘At the Beach’
- Charlotte Elliott – Year 6, Harkaway Hills College – ‘Kangaroos at Sunset’
- Bethany Everard – Year 5, Harkaway Hills College – ‘The Old Lounge Room’
- Ilaria Faulknor – Year 6, Fitzroy Community School – ‘Sparkles in the City’
- Harper French – Year 5, Wesley College – ‘Tiny Child’s Bedtime Story’
- Livian Gomes – Year 6, Loreto Mandeville Hall – ‘You Belong Here – Reverse Poem’
- Emily Hack – Year 6, Harkaway Hills College – ‘The New Day’
- Maverick Lawrence-Politis – Year 5, Penleigh and Essendon Grammar School – ‘How Would You Feel?’
- Averia Mangano – Year 5, Casey Grammar School – ‘You Are Always with Me’
- Valeria Castro O’Byrne – Year 6, Harkaway Hills College – ‘Spring’s Approach’
- Andrea Poh – Year 5, Harkaway Hills College – ‘The Manor’
- Flynn Radford – Year 5, Girton Grammar School – ‘Friendship’
- Norah Rao – Year 5, Girton Grammar School – ‘Friendship’
- Sienna Sawyer – Year 6, Harkaway Hills College – ‘Hidden Memories’
- Mehak Soin – Year 6, Haileybury City – ‘Our World’
- Charlotte Stinchcombe – Year 6, Red Hill Consolidated School – ‘Reconciliation’
- Aria Ta – Year 6, Wesley College – ‘The Call of Winter’
- Abdullah Talib – Year 5, Fitra Community School – ‘The Dragon’
- Sophie Thomas – Year 6, Harkaway Hills College – ‘Abandoned’
- Monica Yu – Year 6, Harkaway Hills College – ‘Memories’
Performance poetry
- Sarah Naz – Year 6, Al Taqwa College – ‘Belonging’
- Abeera Rizwan – Year 5, Al-Taqwa College – ‘Home is Where you Belong’
- Samiha Rukayat – Year 5, Al-Taqwa College – ‘Fire: Menace or Comfort?’
- Ava Sydney Hewitt – Year 6, Donvale Hill – ‘The One’
- Fatima Waqas – Year 5, Al-Taqwa College – ‘Hope – A Light in the Darkness’
Read and watch more from this year’s Student Poetry Competition.
