Ros Spencer Poetry Prize 2025 Second Place to Colleen Keating

colleen Poetry, Poetry Awards 31/08/202531/08/2025

^{EXCITING NEWS}

^{WINNER OF SECOND PLACE}

^IN

^{THE ROS SPENCER POETRY COPETITION 2025}

Colleen Keating

Second Place

2025

ROS SPENCER POETRY PRIZE

for

‘THE LAST WAY”

CONGRATULATIONS FURTHER FOR THE LONG LISTED POEM

Where her father walked

Both poems will be published in BRUSHSTROKES VI to be launched in Novemeber 2025

I am very honoured and excited to be the runner up, winning second prize in the Ros Spencer Poetry Competition 2025.

From over 600 poems to be named un the long list then short listed and finally come out a winner is very affirming.

It is also special to have two poems included in the latest WA Poets Brushstrokes VI

BRUSHSTROKES VI

Thamk you to the contest judge, KEVIN GILLAM and to the patron GEOFF SPENCER
It was an honour to hear him speak of his late wife Ros and read one of his poems.

The Last Way is a sestina I wrote early this year as an exercise
and in memory of a touching and powerful monumant
we visited in Minsk , Belaruse on our Europian trip in 2017.

The monument has stayed with me these past 8 years and
wanting to write but always unsuccessfully until I tried the sestina .
Here the circuar rhythm and and repetition works well as the journey
is not a vertical journey but a internal struggle and experience of facing death.

This is the only competition-ready sestina I have written .
Most poets regard it as a notoriously challenging form, with its six end words rotating
in a specific pattern throughout the sestinia’s six sestets and final envoi tercet.

Late Winter Walk at Kur-ring-gai Wildflower garden

colleen Poetry 27/08/202530/08/2025Haibun, late winter walk, spring, wildflowers

Haibun

A break in the weather gives us the incentive to pack the thermos and head to Ku ring-gai Wildflower Garden.
The earthy smell of rain beguiles. Trails of twinkling webs, gossamer fine, hang like garlands of stars.
The chickering of a creek and rustle underfoot play into the after-rain bird song.

First hints of spring are blossoms peeping from cover ,like brave soldiers on the march.
Our walking becomes a ramble as we take time to enjoy their courage.

winter afternoon
cootamundra wattle
a show stopper

And then we become aware of signs of spring everywhere.
First buds of bacon and eggs, pink wax flower, white wedding bush
red mountain devil, wild purple iris, bravely waiting for the spring warmth
to break out from their undercover and take the bush by storm

red grevillea
curls its spidery spindles
daddy long-legs

Even though it is chilly and frosty spring will come.
Days slowly lengthen and little by little the ambiance of the winter sun
turns towards us in the south. Winter freeze giving way and on our return
lit dew shimmers on every blade of grass.

on a high branch
the kookaburra chortles
spring

Ros Spencer Poetry Prize 2025 Long list Colleen Keating

colleen Poetry, Poetry Awards 19/08/202520/08/2025Ros Spencer Poetry Prize Long list, WA Poets

Dear Colleen,

Congratulations! Your poems Last Way (Monument to Fallen Jewish People in Minsk, Belarus) & where her father walked have been longlisted by our judge Kevin Gillam for the 2025 Ros Spencer Poetry Prize. All longlisted poems will be included in the Brushstrokes Anthology (forthcoming later this year).

The shortlist will be revealed soon and the winners announced at WA Poets Presents on Thursday August 28th from 6-8pm at The City of Perth Library, as part of the 2025 Perth Poetry Festival. We’d love you to join us there for an uplifting evening of recognition, resonance, and readings from some of the state’s finest voices.

Attendance at this event is free but you do need to register:

events.humanitix.com/ppf2025-awards

Best Wishes

Jaya Penelope

Contest Admininstrator

_____________________________________________________________________-

PS I am excited to be long listed but I am only showing one quarter of the list

so to move to the short list is a challenge.

But I am so excited to be twice on the list.

Fingers crossed to move to the short list,

Great to know that my two poems will be in Brushstrokes lll

Ring the Bells by Colleen Keating. Published by Ginninderra Press

colleen General, Poetry 10/08/202516/08/2025Embracing hope, Ginninderra Press, poetry as an antidote for these times, Ring the Bells, Ring the Bells published by Ginninderra Press

Finally it is here. To be published on the 20th August 2025. The countdown is on.

I will have copies to sell very soon. Send your address to me via message or email. I will give you my BSB

– $ 20 plus postage and when Ring the Bells arrives I will send it immediately.

Email me taichi@bigpond.net.au

Writing this poetry over the past few years and compiling Ring the Bells has been my antidote to these times we live in

and I hope it is an antidote for you too.

Ring the Bells is a collection of new poetry

with an invitation to hear each poem

as a bell chime embracing light, dark, life and love – cyclic like the seasons.

In Ring the Bells, award-winning poet Colleen Keating

invites readers to listen closely —

to the chimes of joy,

the tolls of grief,

and the quiet notes of love

that echo through our shared human experience.

Moving through four sections —

Embracing Light,

Embracing Dark,

Embracing Life,

and Embracing Love — her poems ring with an acute awareness

of the world’s beauty and its brokenness.

From intimate moments in nature

to the great sweep of history and current events,

Keating’s lyrical voice finds hope, tenderness, and resilience

in the spaces where light filters through the cracks.

the temple bell stops –
but the sound keeps coming
out of the flowers

Basho (1644-94)
(trans by Robert Bly)

Piercingly beautiful. Each poem a chime

embracing light

embracing dark

embracing life

embracing love

from a poet with a vibrant and curious mind in love with life..