Regoni sweeps student competition

A large crowd gathered at the Lanier Library on Saturday, April 27 to hear the results of the fifth annual Sidney Lanier Award Poetry Competition.

Opening remarks were made by the competition’s organizer, Frances Flynn, and the poet and former North Carolina Poet Laureate Cathy Smith Bowers was the competition’s judge presented twenty-four awards to the competition’s finalists.

The competitor who had to wait the longest to hear the his name called was Lee Stockdale of Tryon, who won First Prize in the main competition for his poem, “The Barn.”

In a sensational sweep of first, second and third prizes, as well as two poems being honorably mentioned, Chelsea Regoni of Campobello, S.C. was cheered as she accepted each of her prizes in the student competition. She was also the winner of the 2011 and 2012 student competitions. Regoni is a junior at the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities in Greenville, S.C. and her winning poem was titled, “Fourth Grade Gym Class.”

Due to a number of appropriate entries, Bowers added a humor category to the competition this year, which was won by Lynn Paul Elwell of Durham, N.C., for his poem, “Insanity Plea.” Elwell was the overall winner of the 2012 competition.

Prizes amounting to $1,150 were awarded as follows: in the adult competition – first, Lee Stockdale of Tryon for “The Barn”; second, Richard Danforth of Columbus for “Deadbolt”; third, Lynn Paul Elwell of Durham for “Do You Remember?”