If You're a Poet, We Want to Know it! Volume 4

The fourth annual Kapiti Coast Libraries poetry contest – If You’re a Poet, We Want to Know It - invited poets to write a poem on the theme of winter or Matariki. ‘April is the cruellest month’ in the northern hemisphere, according to T. S. Eliot. However, in our part of the world, the hardest time of year is June, July and August which bring southerly gales, rain and cold. But there are compensations: the beautiful Matariki constellation, snow-capped Tararua Ranges above Otaki and walks on the beach under the ever-changing gaze of Kapiti Island.

We trust you’ll find in this volume something that resonates with your own experience of winter or Matariki. The library received 81 poems across each of three age groups: children – age 6-12; teens – age 13-18; and adults – age 19 and older.