Do you Sci-ku?

Our winners were awarded for their outstanding sci-kus at Where Worlds Collide on Saturday 20 August. See their names and poems up in lights on the RiAus ticker tape at the Science Exchange.

You can read the winning poems here:

Primary Category

1^st Prize: Jake Deigan

Tall green trees,
They reach up high into the sky,
Water drizzling softly down.

2^nd Prize: Kai Goodman

Experiments.
What’s inside your real body?
Swirling patterns.

3^rd Prize: Jessica Freeman

Stars and meteors,
So many planets aligned,
Making us sweet life.

Highly Commended: Tarlay Huxtable

I like Helium,
It makes you talk really weird,
It blows up balloons

Highly Commended: Milly Copping-James

She is hungry. Very. Slowly she devours the forest, turning fresh green to burning orange and red, leaves to ashes. She is a true daughter of destruction. When she has gone, the forest is quiet, it’s spirit quenched. Then, slowly, a green bud shoots out of the soil. A new beginning…

Secondary Category

1^st Prize: Matthew Podgorski

A miscalculated movement
A plume of Bromine engulfs the classroom; the hubbub of fleeing feet
Fire engines wail in the distance

2^nd Prize: Isabella Somerville

New life
Fire dances from tree to tree
It leaves a blackened trail of destruction
A single seed pod cracks, green amongst black

Open Category

1^st Prize: Laurinda Bailey

A climate library
slowly documenting the seasons,
ring by silent ring.

2^nd Prize: Thomas Tu

Frenzied matter zoo
Then, Mendeleev’s table
The world ranked and filed

3^rd Prize: Stephanie Garnbrill

Known locations
Momentum uncertain
Love by distance.

Highly Commended: Sam Molloy

It took me a while.
To understand osmosis.
I’ve soaked it up now.

Highly Commended: Rob Walker

Carbon
Black and soft as soot
or clear and diamond-hard
You are the Lego of Life.

Thank you to all who submitted their sci-kus!

The RiAus, Friendly Street Poets and COSMOS Magazine were delighted to present their second annual sci-ku poetry competition. This year, we sent out a call for sci-kus with either chemistry or forest themes in recognition of 2011 being both the International year of Chemistry and Forests. Our entrants unleashed their inner poets and sent us their best science haikus.

Great prizes were awarded to those who mastered the art of the sci-ku.

What is sci-ku?
Inspired by the Japanese haiku, sci-ku is basically a short, three-lined poem about the sciences. Sci-ku is a small, modest and humble poem that depicts the everyday world around us, aiming to give a flash of insight into that world — like a scientific ‘Eureka!’ moment expressed briefly in words.

Sci-ku criteria
Each poem needed to have a thematic link to chemistry or forests and not exceed the three-line maximum. Syllable counts were irrelevant. Each entrant was invited to submit a maximum of three sci-kus.

Categories
Entries were made in primary (12 years and under), secondary (13-18 inclusive) or open (no age limit) categories.

The rules
All poems needed to be original, unpublished (in text form or online) works by the poet entering the competition.
All poets needed to be residents of Australia.
All entries needed to be received by Friday 15 July 2011 or be date stamped Thursday 14 July 2011 at the latest.
No poems to be returned.
The judges’ decision is final; no further correspondence will be accepted.

The prizes
1st prize winners in each category will receive a Kindle e-Reader and a $50 book voucher.
2nd & 3rd prizes will be awarded in each category, with prizes of $80 and $50 worth of book vouchers, respectively.1st, 2nd & 3rd prize winners in each category will see their sci-ku and name in lights on RiAus’ unique digital sash artwork on the exterior of the Science Exchange building in Adelaide (as seen above).
1st, 2nd & 3rd prizes (and other selected entries) will be published on the RiAus & Friendly Street Poets websites and in the Friendly Street Poets annual anthology Reader 36.
Other great prizes from Wakefield Press.

Please direct any questions to sciku@riaus.org.au.

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