I don't know what if any embargo the people at SLQ impose on the subsequent publication of their poetry competition's winning entries. However, at least as a courtesy, I thought I'd leave a year or so before republishing my Sonnet 74, which was commended in the SLQ's November 2016 competition. The year in question being up, I think it's probably in order to go ahead with the republication of 74. It's a conventional Shakespearean sonnet - iambic pentameter, ababcdcdefefgg rhyme scheme - in the form of a parody of the opening lines of the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, and is intended as an anatomisation of nihilistic Bristolian sleaziness and pessimism, with topical references e.g. the Trump Presidency locating it as the product of Autumn last year.
Sonnet 74
Whan that Novembre wyth hys soddynge leaves
of Yndyc Summer hys layt standde hath drownn’d,
and raynnes yternal blyte ye mowldy glebe
and clerkes skulck yn thayr cells yn studye brownne;
whan erly nyt and drearye mornyngge greyye
array ye darklyngge slummes yn damppe drabbenesse,
and laytest tydyngges fromme ye U.S.A.
extyngwyssh’d havve alle howpe and happynesse,
than longen knayves to gowe onne herowynne.
Nowwe sleezye marchaunts bearyngge Chyna Wyte,
and hypsters wyth a thyngge for Bombayye jynne
and Wyte Ace drynkers, these forsaykyngge Spryte,
converge lyk starvyngge dogges onne queynt Stowkes Crofft,
and daunce Saynt Vytus jyv wyth armes alofft.
