Competition winners

Science in Creative Writing Competition Winners, 2016-17.

We really enjoyed reading the entries for this year’s competition on the topic of "powers of nature". It was tough to make a final decision but we are pleased to announce the winners and runners-up.

Year 9 poetry category

Winner: Monica McManaman, 'Sun'

I was a light.

A combination of everything dark and glowing and happy and sad.
A torch in a dark cave.
Without light, the world would be infinitely cursed with eternal darkness.

I was bright.

A lit flame in a world of sorrow and darkness,
Full of incompetent idiots and morals and rules.
With nothing bright, surely the world would be far too dull for anyone to handle.

I was the mighty one.

The star of all stars: the alpha.
One that shone day after day, but why did they leave at night?
What else could a star be occupied with, after all?

I had a job.

And not only that, an important job.
I was a natural alarm clock to begin the day,
Nothing would be over ‘til I’d gone away.
I was the only reliable way to decide,
If the sky would allow a family day out to the seaside.

I was the leader.

All of the planets circled me
Consequently, I felt like royalty
Despite Saturn being the one with the rings.

I was in control.

And I liked it.
The power I had was more than any of the planets combined
More so than Earth, even with all their resources
I was at peace.
Things were going well for me
Life for the sun had finally calmed down

But just when I thought that the stars had aligned,
That I was a bright, mighty light,

I burned out.

It was the year three thousand
There was nothing left,
Besides dust, and myself.

I was alone.
As time passed,
I wasn’t so sure that the dust and I were all that different
All along, I’d kept my distance

I was a leader. Was.

Yet suddenly I was insignificant 
Nothing mattered anymore
My insignificance was overbearing and I couldn't bear the thought
Of meaning nothing
To anybody at all

Since I was once the alpha
The leader of the system
The stars aligned and I kept my distance 
From anything I saw as different 

I was afraid.

The powerful sun 
I could move shadows and create day and cause night
I was the reason for all of the light in the world
But I was afraid of the dust

I was afraid that one day, that's all that would be left.

I was right.

The world had ended.
For so long I had pretended
That I mattered more.

Runner-Up: Rheanon Shaw, 'Pompeii'

Destruction fuelled the terror like petrol fuels a car,
Eyes were harassed by the black, demonic, dusty smoke that just kept possessing our lungs,
It was falling, death was falling upon us.
We are the souls frozen in time. 
 
Rivers of murdering, explosive, drowning lava flooded our skin with scars of traumatic memories,
We were swimming; swimming to our permanent graves,
To be locked, imprisoned, isolated in our last emotions.
We are the souls frozen in time. 

Families flee carrying young, innocent, fragile children,
If the monster hadn’t lost its temper, our eyes would see another day
Our ears, laughter and our hands a loving soul.
We don’t want to be the souls frozen in time.

Year 9 prose category

Winner: Abbie Calvert: 'There was no time to react'

There was no time to react, there wasn't even a sound to warn them, at first. Only a deadly silence. In its shadow, even the very air held its breath. As blazing magma violently forced itself through its vents, a low, foreboding rumble could be heard from within, and then - nothing - until another, more menacing rumble shattered the terrible silence and very suddenly a thick, ash cloud emerged from its mouth, shooting high into the sky – soon punctuated by a deafening crack. As the cloud rapidly engulfed the remaining light, it had cloaked the landscape with a suffocating darkness. In an instant, raging lava had begun to advance swiftly down the hillside towards a decidedly doomed settlement.
 
The people within the settlement had begun to run; they wouldn't get away. Birds were flying from their nests, the trees in which they roosted were creaking and groaning in a hopeless protest to their inescapable fate as the approaching lava mindlessly set them ablaze without a moment of hesitation. Without any warning, a scorching cloud of ash and rocks then began to barrel down the hillside, trampling or disintegrating any surviving wildlife as it descended at a catastrophically swift pace directly towards the soon to be ruined settlement – rocks plummet into their abandoned homes and towards any life-form that happens to be in its path. The ash cloud consumes the remains of the settlement – slaughtering any potential survivors. Within a matter of seconds, where there was once houses and people, there was only ruins and a grave silence… Soon however, there would be be no ruins left, as the lava raced through the remains of the lifeless settlement – burning everything.

Runner-Up: Amy Lea Glover: 'Volcano Story'

The only way to escape was to run nearer the volcano… There was no other path to take but this one – as risky as it is was, I needed to get away from that dreadful place. Nervous and scared, anxious and terrified I stepped closer to the roaring volcano as it blew jet black ashes into the sky. The gaping hole of the volcano’s mouth taunted me closer with the hot air from the thick lava propelled into my face. It was completely mesmerising: the swirling lava like a pool of blistering water. Thoughts danced around my head of why I was here and what I would miss as I stared into the flaming red abyss.

The crackling of the fire beneath me reminded me of the ones that I left back in the town I grew up in, there was no looking back now though. In the fire my life played out in the colour-changing fire: my family looking at me with disappointment in their eyes; my friends turning their backs against me in disgust and me looking at myself in the old dusty mirror knowing I’d have to leave. My mind raced with the thoughts of my past but then the lava beneath the stone started to erupt from the ground.

My racing heart did leaps inside me when I noticed the stones shaking under my trembling toes, the volcano roared and my body jumped at how loud the roar was. Startled and alarmed, shocked and shaken my legs decided to finally take action and run as fast as they could possibly take me; the lava not following far behind my racing limbs. Feeling my energy get low and my legs start to go numb I almost gave up.

Award for Best Year 5 class

• Litherland Moss Primary School.