The awards event for the 35th Reuben Rose Poetry Competition took place via Zoom on April 27th 2025. Thirty-two people attended: prize-winners, their guests, and Voices Israel members from Israel and other countries including the UK, USA and Canada.
As usual, the competition’s administrator, Mark L. Levinson, gave us the facts and figures on this year’s entries. Our overseas judge, Nancy Shiffrin from the United States, unfortunately couldn’t attend, but the other two judges, Dina Yehuda (last year’s First Prize winner) and Judy Koren (last year’s Second Prize winner), both from Israel, gave enthusiastic comments.
This year three Third Prizes were awarded, for a total of fifteen winners: five prize-winners and, as usual, ten recipients of Honorable Mentions. Julian Alper, the Voices Israel President, invited the poets of the top fifteen, almost all of whom were with us, to read their winning poems; Voices Israel members proxy-read for two Honorable Mention recipients who couldn’t be there.
The texts of all the poems, and audio recordings of four of the winners reading their poems, are on the 2024 Reuben Rose Competition page, accessible also from the list of winning poems year by year on the Winners and Poem Texts page.
We had time at the end for a short Open Mic session, where several of our members, including some from overseas, each read one of their poems.
We recorded the event via Zoom, including the Open Mic at the end, and have uploaded the video to the Voices Israel YouTube channel. The ink is being sent to all our members and everyone else who registered to attend Feel free to share them with whoever you like!
Below are a few screenshots to give a feel of the evening.
Voices Israel Group of Poets in English 