Poetry Contest: Feathered Favorite
JULY/AUGUST 2025
While admiring the shorebirds and city pigeons in this issue, the bugs realized that, with the exception of Ugly Bird, most birds aren’t so bad. Many of them are, in fact, spectacular. For this month’s contest, everybuggy would love to read your very best poem celebrating your favorite bird.
Perhaps you’ll write an ode to a bird that behaves in a surprising way, like a gull soaring over the desert or a loon diving to unknown depths. Or you might be inspired by a bird found in a protected place, like the oilbirds Carla and Manuelo discover in “The Cave of the Oilbird” or a songbird taking refuge in a little patch of green created by someone as brave as Tia in “My Corner.” Your bird might be as clever as the talking starling in “The Bird’s Message” or as brilliantly decorated as the “Peacock on Parade.”
Whether your preferred bird is a real species or your own flight of fancy, everybuggy
in Cricket Country will have their eagle eyes on the mailbox, waiting for your poem—of 24 lines or fewer, please—to fly in.
Here are the only rules:
- Your contest entry must be your very own original work. Ideas and words should not be copied.
- Your entry must be signed by your parent or guardian, stating that it is your own work, that no help was given, and that CRICKET has permission to publish it in the magazine and on our website.
- Be sure to include your first name, last initial, age, and state on your entry.
- Only one entry per person, please.
- Your entry must be received by August 25, 2025.
- Email entries to cricket@cricketmedia.com.
- We will publish winning entries in an upcoming issue and online.
