Results of the Shelley Memorial Project 2026 International Poetry Competition on the theme of liberty, judged by Bassie Gracie
A glorious people vibrated again
The lightning of the nations:
Liberty From heart to heart, from tower to tower, o’er Spain, Scattering contagious fire into the sky, Gleamed.
from Ode to Liberty, Percy Bysshe Shelley,
inspired by the revolution in Spain in 1820
Sussex Cup: Fences by Andrew Miller
1st place: LIBERTY - Dimensions of birthing freedom by Vallen Lippenberg
2nd place: What was taken by Sally Steele
3rd place: Giving up for good by Andrew George
Have you ever watched bindweed growing,
patient and quick, day after day,
sending out soft tendrils to wind through barbed wire?
A fence built high enough to keep out the sun
could never hold back the night
or the wonders hidden there
Steel and concrete, wood and wire
Narrow, fearful, fragile and foolish
We send fences running deep into the wilds of our hearts,
praying for a safety that will never come
Love and oceans know nothing of them
Deer jump them
Clouds ignore them
Birds perch on them
Dogs piss on them
Rust and rot eats them
The wind uses them to sing
One day the earth will shake herself free
And all our fences
Will be gone.
Bassie Gracie says:
I loved this poem because it reminded me of the trespass laws in the UK and the anti-trespass movements. It is simple and effective.
Winner of the Sussex Cup:
Fences by Andrew Miller
1st place: LIBERTY - Dimensions of birthing freedom by Vallen Lippenberg
Bassie Gracie says:
This poem is so powerful and beautiful. It has such a visceral description of child birth and the description of the mother-daughter relationship really moved me.
You keep waiting for someone to hand you permission, to tell you it's alright to want this much, to take up this much room.
Nobody does. So you take it anyway.
You grow a whole person under your own ribs while still going to work, still paying bills, still being told to smile more, ask less, shrink a little for comfort's sake.
And then your body just goes ahead and does the one thing no one can shrink, no one can talk down, no one can schedule around a meeting. It becomes the loudest thing in the room.
Nine months of being underestimated while quietly building a heartbeat from nothing.
Then labor comes, and it is not delicate. It is not polite. It doesn't ask permission either.
It arrives like something ancient, finally getting to speak, your whole body clenching and releasing like a fist unclenching after a lifetime of being told to behave.
You sweat through it. You swear through it. You grip a hand, a rail, a stranger's shoulder, because for once nobody is asking you to be graceful.
They just need you to be strong, and you are, in the oldest, rawest way there is.
Every contraction is a door slamming somewhere far off, a door that used to say quiet, that used to say smaller, that used to say wait your turn.
And your body says no. Not this time.
Then the room goes still, and a cry breaks it open, sharp and furious and completely unapologetic, the first sound of someone who hasn't learned yet to make herself small.
They put her on your chest, damp and blinking, fists already curled like she's ready to fight for something, and you think, good. Start now. Don't ever put those down.
You look at her and understand, maybe for the first time, that your body was never something to apologize for. It just did the one thing nothing else on earth can do.
It made a person. Out of blood and breath and sheer will.
No one gave you permission for that. You didn't need it.
Somewhere in the exhaustion and the joy and the shaking hands you feel it settle into your bones, quiet but sure, that freedom was never going to be handed to you.
You were always going to have to push for it yourself, the way you just did, screaming and glorious and unstoppable, bringing a whole new life into a world that will now have to make room for both of you.
2nd place: What was taken by Sally Steele
Bassie Gracie says:
This poem is really emotional, and the parallels drawn between dementia and the paranoia after a burglary is a unique perspective.
We woke to the call in the night:
her home broken, glass glinting in torchlight,
handbags ransacked, drawers spilling,
costume jewellery studding the duvet
like Elizabethan court dress.
No trace—no footprints, no blood.
Apart from the bedroom all seemed in place:
ornaments still sat on doilies edged with lace.
“Has anything of value been taken?”
“Nothing I treasure,” she said—
but something priceless was gone:
the easy set of her mind.
It came from afar, travelled by air,
crept in unnoticed—doors left ajar.
Stealthy at first, stalking,
then emboldened, striking indiscriminately,
stealing liberty, livelihood, lives.
She hid in isolation behind
bolted doors, double-locked windows,
refused visits—just in case.
Warnings with lunch,
reheated at tea,
pressed in at bedtime—
at night they lay beside her,
still talking.
She thought nothing was taken—
but the thief held her laughter,
like the broken spin-drier, rusting in the shed.
Now she’s sure there’s a thief:
“My pinny’s been taken. My baking things have gone!”
“No one’s pinched your apron or your rolling pin—
it’s like you’re on holiday with bed and board all in.”
“Nothing’s where it should be. Where’s your dad?”
(Eternally gone.)
“When am I going home?”
“A few more days,” I say.
(The house had to be sold.)
There was no thief at the care home.
Truth, choice, dignity—
taken by me.3rd place: Giving up for good by Andrew George
Bassie Gracie says:
This poem serves an interesting take on what freedom is and made me laugh out loud.
They’ve banned the children from smoking,
not just while they’re children but for ever.
Never, never shall they legally acquire
a cigarette, these boys and girls who won’t grow up.
And this is as it should be. Change we want –
like when we emptied every trouser pocket
then cadged the final coin from off a friend
to drop into the metal slot, yank the lever,
pack the cellophane-wrapped cancer-candy up.
They’ll do it next with drinking I expect.
Some unsuspecting toddler will discover
he cannot now or anywhen drink vodka.
Then wrestling, hang gliding and fireworks.
What fun to be among these happy ever after
as, elderly, enjoying our last rights,
we gatecrash all their gatherings,
uncorking bottles, draining glasses, lighting up.