Contests

Poetry Contest: Your Embarrassing Moment

Everybuggy has been in embarrassing situations, like Zan in “Pigskins and Pirouettes.” Sluggo once ran so slowly to first base that he was called out for delay of game. At the Cricket Country festival, Pudding’s light went out in the middle of her soliloquy. Ladybug once had an argument with Cricket about whether or not the planet Uranus had rings—and was wrong! (For the first time in her life, she said.)

For this month’s contest, all the bugs long to read your very best poem about an embarrassing moment. 

Will you write about something that really happened to you, or imagine an embarrassing situation that you’ve been lucky enough to avoid (so far)? Will your poem be about a cringe-worthy moment that happened at school, or while playing sports, or while out in public with your family? Perhaps you were embarrassed because you were trying to keep a secret from a friend or discovered you had a secret admirer? Maybe you’ll write about what might embarrass a creature that isn’t even human. 

Whatever inspires your verse, everybuggy will be squirming, red-faced around the Cricket Country mailbox—and thinking, I’m so glad that didn’t happen to me!—as they read your best poem of 24 lines or less about something really embarrassing. 

  • (Show Rules)
    Here are the only rules: (Hide Rules)
    1. Your contest entry must be your very own original work. Ideas and words should not be copied.
    2. If you're 14 years old or younger, your entry must be signed by your parent or guardian, saying it is your own original work, that no help was given, and granting Cricket permission to publish prizewinning entries in the January 2015 issue or on our Web site. If you're older than 14, you must sign your own work, verifying that it is original.
    3. Be sure to include your name, age, and full address on your entry.
    4. Only one entry per person, please.
    5. If you want your work returned, enclose a self-addressed, stamped envelope for each entry.
    6. Incomplete entries cannot be considered. Your entry will be incomplete if you forget to include your age or a signature verifying that your work is original.
    7. Your entry must be received by September 25, 2014.
    8. Send entries to:
      Cricket League
      P.O. Box 300
      Peru, IL 61354