SCP Poet Paul A. Freeman recently won the King’s English Poetry Competition with the below sonnet:
February Fog in Abu Dhabi
A nebula of sight-resistant fog
creeps in at night, proceeding to erect
a barricade of cotton wool to clog
the air. Eyeball integrity is wrecked.
My universe attunes itself to sound:
a solitary cricket’s scratching legs,
pedestrians whose muffled footfalls pound
and cars that roll down roads like hollow kegs.
The streetlight punctuation dot, dot, dots
the pavements and the junctions where I walk
(their hazy shades illuming landmark spots)
and avenues where falling leaf-drops talk.
Yet fog is like nocturnal-driven fears;
come daylight’s sun-kissed glow, it disappears.
Paul A. Freeman is the author of Rumours of Ophir, a crime novel which was taught in Zimbabwean high schools and has been translated into German. In addition to having two novels, a children’s book and an 18,000-word narrative poem (Robin Hood and Friar Tuck: Zombie Killers!) commercially published, Paul is the author of hundreds of published short stories, poems and articles.
Congratulations, Paul!
Well done Paul!
Fog is a very fine character. Congratulations, Paul!
A singular honour, Paul. Congratulations. And what a fine sonnet: I love the closing couplet.
Congratulations, Paul. That would seem to be a significant accomplishment! There must have been tough competition for such a prize. Proud of you.
Thanks, Roy. The competition is quarterly. If you check the link, it says there were 211 entries, nine of which were of a traditional format.
Congratulations, Paul! A really excellent sonnet, your win is well-deserved!!
This is an absolutely exquisite description of fog, Paul! Cars rolling like hollow kegs; streetlights’ punctuation dots; falling leaf-drops talking; and the comparison in the final couplet — all marvelous! And what a prestigious award!
That sonnet, written on a morning walk, is very special to me in that I can vividly remember every sight and every sound as I made my notes and started toying with rhymes. In fact, the sonnet was virtually finished by the time I got home.
Mind you, it was a long walk.
Really excellent work, Paul. What a worthy example of “The King’s English.” My sincerest congratulations.
Thanks, Joseph. That means a lot.
Congratulations are indeed in order, both for your success and for the poem itself, wherein you shift easily from the more usual visual descriptions to the auditory, and it sounds perfectly natural and apt. The sounds make pictures–convincingly, without strain. A fine poem.
When I wrote this poem, Bhikkhu, there was pronounced silence, as if the fog was sucking up all the sound, so I listened out for those sounds that were more prominent and more unusual.
Paul, congratulations on your beautifully written, award-winning sonnet! I look forward to studying your poem to improve my sonnet writing skills.
To be honest, Thomas, I’ll probably go back to this sonnet myself to work out how it went so right. If only I could bottle it!
Congratulations, Paul! A worthy sonnet full of seemingly easy invention. The closing couplet is indeed winning, but remember: in San Francisco, especially in summer, the fog is apt to lift about 2:30 pm, then starts rolling in again around 5:00.
Thanks, Julian. Those closing couplets are what usually takes the most time when I write a sonnet. Damp squib endings after putting so much effort in ruin the whole sonnet, I feel – and I’ve had a few damp squib sonnets in my time, when I revisit them months or years down the road.
Double congratulations, Paul, on the great distinction of winning this award a second time! I’m glad the Society of Classical Poets has published “February Fog in Abu Dhabi” because your 2023 winner, “An Apple for Geoffrey Chaucer,” no longer appears with us. The British page to which SCP linked on October 16, 2023, has vanished into cyberspace. Perhaps you could supply the poem, and allow Evan to place it on our notice of your previous win, in order to make sense of the many comments you received at that time.
Thanks, Margaret. Yes, I won the competition before two years ago, when it was the Queen’s English Poetry Competition. I’ll check out ‘An Apple for Geoffrey Chaucer’ and do the necessary, as they say in the Arabian Gulf.
Paul, you’re going to have to update your SCP bio to reflect these winnings!
I’d love to know a bit more about the reference to Abu Dhabi. Did you spend significant time there? Thanks.
I was in Abu Dhabi for fourteen years, Cheryl, and my wife still works there. It’s where my kids grew up before leaving the nest.
Yep, I do need to update my profile.
Congratulations Paul on your well deserved win with your beautifully descriptive sonnet!
Another congratulation here, Paul. It’s a truly lovely sonnet. You must be tickled, especially by the ease in which it seemed to come to you. No doubt that was due to your diligent and time-worn practice of the art.
Unfortunately, they don’t all come that easy, jd. If only!
Congratulations to you! For a Wonderful atmospheric sonnet! I was walking with you, in my mind, and the whole scenery became alive. ‘Fog is like nocturnal-driven fears” is a beautifully haunting line… it’s comforting to be, at the end, back in the sunlight.
Thanks for reading and commenting, Scharlie. Indeed, the fogs in that part of the world get very claustrophobic.
Paul, How nice to see that “the King’s English” still recognizes formal poetry. I remember once having a poem accepted for publication in an edition of the California State Poetry Society’s “California Quarterly.” There were 57 poems in the journal and mine was the only one with rhyme and meter (three quatrains of iambic pentameter). I couldn’t decide if they routinely reject such poems or whether formal poets simply do not submit their work to them. My guess is that the one has followed from the other. Congratulations on being good enough to have beaten the odds! Well done!
Sometimes it’s surprising that a potential poetry market you think might not welcome traditional poetry, is just waiting for traditional poetry to be submitted.