SymmyS Awards for Best New Palindromes

As a favor to our friends over at The Palindromist Magazine, here are the results of the SymmyS Awards for Outstanding Palindromic Achievement in 2018.

Recap: Poet and small press publisher Anthony Etherin thoroughly dominated the 8th annual SymmyS Awards, placing in the top three in every category and tieing for the Grand Prize with his palindrome “For Idris Elba:”

Able sir, did nobody fit recognise it ties in? Go, certify—do Bond, Idris Elba!

Etherin took all three spots in the Long Palindrome category, first and second in Poetry, first place in Word Unit palindromes (like the 3 Musketeers’ slogan, One For All and All For One!), second in Short Palindromes, and third in cartoons (with his partner Clara Daneri; together they run Penteract Press in Shropshire, England).

The big win is a good appetizer for a big book release party Etherin and Daneri will host on October 4th at The Swan in Cheltenham, England. Among the four books to be released is “Reflections,” containing palindromes by Etherin, several other SymmyS winners, and top palindromists around the world.

Etherin shared his Grand Prize with Peter Sabra, who won the Short Palindrome category with his “Diet Failure:”

Salad, lo-cal, left a fat fella cold, alas.

Other SymmyS veterans scored as well, including World Palindrome Champion Martin Clear of Australia, runner-up Lori Wike of the United States, and popular author-illustrator Jon Agee. They were joined by newcomer Dylan Smith, who shared his “Origin Story;”

Am I man-made? Damn! Am I, Ma?

Winners were determined by a panel of celebrity judges, including puzzlemaster Will Shortz, award-winning fiction writer Margaret Malone, rapper/MC Paul Barman, Wall Street Journal columnist Ben Zimmer, filmmaker Vince Clemente, palindromist Jeff Grant of New Zealand, and Dutch scholar Johan Jeuring.

2019 SymmyS winners

Grand Prize

1. (tie) For Idris Elba, Anthony Etherin
Able sir, did nobody fit recognise it ties in? Go, certify—do Bond, Idris Elba!

1. (tie) Diet failure, Peter Sabra
Salad, lo-cal, left a fat fella cold, alas.

3. The Humanist, Anthony Etherin (word-unit palindrome)
Can we suppose man created God?
There is nothing suggesting we are divine.
Are we suggesting nothing is there?
“God created man”—suppose we can?

Short Palindromes

1. Diet failure, Peter Sabra
Salad, lo-cal, left a fat fella cold, alas.

2. (tie) How To Draw A Pyramid, Anthony Etherin
A zig. Now one zag. Gaze now on Giza!

2. (tie) Origin story, Dylan Smith
Am I man-made? Damn! Am I, Ma?

Long Palindromes

1. The Failed Cartographer, Anthony Etherin
Demand a hill, at solid nadir…. Damn it! One morn I saw I was in Rome, not in Madrid, and I lost all I had named….

2. For Idris Elba, Anthony Etherin
Able sir, did nobody fit recognise it ties in? Go, certify—do Bond, Idris Elba!

3. Pets, Anthony Etherin
Pets: A sad dog or fat cat. Nine dragons (no garden intact). A frog, odd as a step.

Palindromic Poetry

1. The Cays, Anthony Etherin

Raft ropes, nets,
you befilth cay isles.
Seven old, lone vessels I yacht—
lifebuoys tense, port far….

2. The Desert, Anthony Etherin

Moody, burned dust…
Oh, still aerify!
My ravine defoliated,
dim, its mirage bites….
Sure no bliss of pools to order,
still its red roots loop fossil bone.
Russet, I beg a rim’s timid detail of Eden.
I vary my fire: All its hot, sudden ruby doom.

3. Midwinter, Lori Wike

Craned dusk,
Radar of tilt
Light raw,
Swarth-gilt
Lit for a dark
Sudden arc

Word Unit Palindromes

1. The Humanist, Anthony Etherin
Can we suppose man created God?
There is nothing suggesting we are divine.
Are we suggesting nothing is there?
“God created man”—suppose we can?

2. End game, Lori Wike
Will his check go through? He is ill. Is he through? Go check his will!

3. Preliminary Results of Double Blind Testing of Viagra, Martin Clear
Trying too hard, getting found out
left those that wrote reports crying
Reports wrote that those left out
found getting hard too trying.