The 2nd Perl Poetry Contest

Perl and linguistics can sometimes seem to go hand in hand. Because of this, many Perl programmers are also master wordsmiths. Luckily, Perl has the fortunate praxis of allowing those which use it, to enjoy free time from rapidly getting work done. Put this factor together with the linguistic prowess if it's users, and a the merriment of Perl Poetry comes to life.

The Perl Poetry Contest is sort of a kinder, less migraine inducing, sibling of the Obfuscation Contest. The Obfuscation Contest promotes the creation of vile looking scripts. The Perl Poetry Contest is the other end of the spectrum, promoting the generation of flowing verse, and Perl, to make something beautiful. So as the Obfuscation Contest goes into it's Winter hibernation, this is the time for you to revel in the poetry of Perl.

Last years contest was a great success. We were able to glimps into the creative minds of Perl Poets from around the globe. Some entries were silly, some deep, and some pushed the boundries of taste. We have hopes that this year will be the same. The following is a winner from last years contest, to help you get your creative juices flowing.

    if ((light eq dark) && (dark eq light)
       && ($blaze_of_night{moon} == black_hole)
       && ($ravens_wing{bright} == $tin{bright})){
       my $love = $you = $sin{darkness} + 1;
    };

Which was derived from these lyrics, by Jim Steinman's song The Invocation.

    If light were dark and dark were light
    The moon a black hole in the blaze of night
    A raven's wing as bright as tin
    Then you, my love, would be darker than sin.

THE CATAGORIES

Again this year we do not wish to put any constricting rules on any poet. However, binaries and poems whose code has malicious mischief will be seen only by the dwellers of /dev/null. Other than that, you can mail us any genre of Perl Poetry you like and enjoy. Here are a few meta-catagories to keep in mind, and all entries should fall somewhere under one of these.

  1. ``Port'' your favorite peom, or lyric, to Perl.
  2. Draft a Perl poem which performs a, maybe useful, task.
  3. Create a program which creates poetry (bonus points if the program is also a poem).
  4. A Haiku, Tanka, or Limerick in or relating to Perl. Haikus(syllable pattern 5-7-5) and tankas (5-7-5-7-7) don't rhyme; limericks (9-9-6-6-9) do, in an AABBA pattern.

JUDGING

All entries must run under a minimum of Perl 5.005, and again will receive extra credit for running under -w and stricture. Credit will be gained with use of rhyme, verse, and clever wordplay. Whitespace is overlooked, but an abuse of comments would not be. We will also look at your use of alphanumeric characters as an articulation of words (for example, @work as ``at work''). And, for extra extra credit, inspiring used of Perl data structures will be smiles upon (such as ``$blaze_of_night{moon} == black_hole'' as ``The moon a black hole in the blaze of night''). You may use standard Perl modules to enhance the usability of your entries.

SUBMITTING

You should enter on or before Friday July 27, 2001 @ 5:00 PM Pacific Time by emailing your poems to contest@perlguy.com. You can enter has many poems, as often as you like before the deadline. Please submit a tar or zip file containing your poem(s), and a README with these items:

  1. Your name and email address.
  2. An explination of what your poem does (if anything).
  3. If you are 'porting' a poem or lyric, please include the original.
  4. Any other special instructions you may like for us to know. For example, should $bill be pronounced as ``dollar bill'', or just bill.
    Now is the time to find your muse, and have some fun! Good luck!

    __END__

    Kevin Meltzer recently moved to Florida and is trying to keep from having his brain hard-boilded by the heat. You can also look for the Writing CGI Application with Perl, which he co-authored, in early 2001.