The SymmyS: 2023
Award-winners of yesteryear.
What follows are the winners of the 2023 SymmyS palindrome competition!
Winners from 2018 to 2022 can be found here, here, here, and here. I’m still looking into pre-2018 winners, so more on that when I get it!
Short
1. Pull a bat up. Put a ball up. (Baseball, by Anthony Etherin)
2. May deer uproot a top potato or pureed yam? (Deer Eats, by Martin Clear)
3. Motto: Bees reign! It's sting-ier. (See bottom) (See Bees, by Peter Sabra)
Medium
1 (tie). Went on. Saw tin. It was not new. (Anthony Etherin)
1 (tie). Won't one man I met in a bar grab an item I name? Not now. (Martin Clear)
3. Mario Kart: Mario speeds in ruts. I honk? No, his turn is deep, so I ram! (Titus Meyer)
Long
1. The Lord Of The Rings (Anthony Etherin)
Eyes, till it’s won, kill orcs.
A nine-men order, baser Gollum.
I mull ogre, sabre, drone—men in a scroll.
I know, still, its eye.
2. Hostage (Martin Clear)
Yell, “A van—I’m in a van!”
It is in a void.
A radio van.
I sit in a van.
I’m in a valley.
3. Fever Dream (Lori Wike)
Beware:
Viral,
I give no serum.
Miserable…
Vertigo…
Fevered states…
États de rêve.
Fog:
It revel-bares,
Immures one.
Vigil:
A river,
A web.
4. Cain (Anthony Etherin)
“Cain” (a man Eve delivered on, as Adam sired) is no cosy name. Now, one many so consider is mad as an ode reviled, even—a maniac.
Poetry
1. Elude Demon In Me, An Acrostic Palindrome Sonnet (Lori Wike)
Elated, echo lives, muse rune,
Lie vast film’s aim, enured am I.
Un-nestle me, café-borne moon,
Dew idle if, astray, assai.
Emote own epic, I, sum won,
Deliria, lived demon, or
Erose most Bedlam’s idyl, none,
Men, only dismal debt, some sorer.
O, no med, Devil air I led,
Now music I pen woe to me.
I assay arts, a field I wed,
No omen, robe, face melts ennui.
Made-rune, miasm lifts a veil,
Enure sum’s evil, oh, cede tale!
2. The Owl (Anthony Etherin)
Too held
in its tide,
tan,
a meek owl woke—
emanated its tin, idle hoot.
3. The Word In The Stone, a palindrome pantoum (Lori Wike)
Mix a mania, gain a maxim
Trades revere no law onward
Midst pure word, a mad row erupts, dim
Trap awe, stone to mere sword
Trades revere no law onward
Page reversal allots time loops
Trap awe, stone to mere sword
Parted a veil, I assay art’s sloops
Spools stray, assail, I evade trap
Drowse remote, not sew, apart
Spool emits toll; alas, revere gap
Draw now, alone, reversed art
Drowse remote, not sew, apart
Midst pure word, a mad row erupts, dim
Draw now, alone, reversed art
Mix a mania, gain a maxim
Visual (Covid by Peter Sabra and John Agee, On The Psychology of Roller Coasters by Lori Wike, Red Robot Putin Is In It Up To Border! by John Agee)
Grand Prize
1. On the Psychology of Roller Coasters, by Lori Wike (see Visual)
2. Red Robot Putin Is In It Up To Border! by Jon Agee (see Visual)
3. Deer Eats by Martin Clear (see Short)
4. Mario Kart, by Titus Meyer (see Visual)
5. See Bees, by Peter Sabra (see Short)