1 . English Poetry Competition of 2022

Enter your poem for a chance to win something! Our poetry contest is held twice a year. Write a poem about how the pandemic (疫情) has changed your life.

Prizes

The contest awards one first place prize of $2,000 and a first prize wall plaque ($100 value); twenty second place prizes of $100 each and a second place wall plaque ($75 value); one hundred third place winners of a third place wall plaque ($25 value).

Rules

Follow all rules carefully to prevent disqualification (取消资格).

IMPORTANT:

☆Poet must be at least thirteen years of age.

☆Only one poem per person, per family is allowed.

☆A poem in its entirety must be an original work by the person centering the contest.

☆All entries are judged anonymously (匿名地). Please do not include your name, address, phone number, etc., or your entry will be disqualified.

Deadline: Email your entry by 31st May 2022.

Length: 42 lines max. No minimum. Title not included in the line count.

Format: Entries must be typed. We do not accept handwritten submissions.

Fees: £10 per poem.

Judging: The judges’ decision is final and no individual correspondence (通信) can be entered into. Judges are unable to comment on individual entries. Judging is fair.

Copyright: Worldwide copyright of each entry remains with the author but the Bridport Prize has unrestricted rights to publish the winning and highly praised poems.

Major school districts around the United States     1     (permit) students to attend class without face coverings to date. New York City ended the     2     (require) rules on March 7.

As we all know, the rules relating to face coverings or masks have caused fights among     3     (educate), school boards and parents throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Some families are happy that their children no longer have to wear masks, which can make children focus     4     study better, while others hold the different ideas about the quitting of the restriction.

Falling COVID-19 infection rates and new federal health recommendations are the driving force for     5     drop of the rules. Even the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently issued new guidelines     6     (say) most healthy Americans, including students can     7     (safe) stop wearing masks. However, there are still many concerns about low vaccination rates among American children     8     officials in many large cities have said they will keep mask rules for the time being.

Undoubtedly, wearing masks can cause trouble for students to understand     9     teachers are instructing in the classroom. But it remains     10     (see) what will happen in the following months, so we are supposed to be cautious about the ongoing changes.

4 . Yesterday, after a day of Zoom (视频会议软件) meetings in my living room, I stepped out for a walk leaving my teen son bored on the couch. Bleecker Street, usually packed with people, was sprinkled with only the occasional pedestrians. Bars and restaurants lining the street were dark. Stores with bright neon lights, doors open, beckoned for the rare passers-by to enter. After just a week of the Covid-19 pandemic, an afternoon walk in Greenwich Village neighborhood felt surreal.

But then I noticed a row of daffodils(水仙)reaching for the sun in the small triangle-shaped park by Minetta Lane. On the windows of a locked restaurant, in bright yellow paint, were the words “We love you, West Village. Take care of each other. ” My phone buzzed—a colleague sent a picture of her newborn baby just home from the hospital. I arrived home to find my son animated on the couch playing a video game virtually with his friends. Life, love, play, and human connection persist, even though our world has been tuned upside down.

In my welcome note to the new students in the Fall, I wrote that this year is about our college’s core values of inclusion, innovation, and impact and emphasized the power of interconnection. Today, these core values persist, with interconnection taking on even greater significance. Our collaborative spirit has always given us an advantage—academically, creatively, culturally, and now, remotely.

A wise person once told me that getting through a crisis is like being given a new hand of cards in the middle of a game. We are halfway through the semester, with new hands to play, but the game hasn’t changed. We will find new ways to continue to work, teach, create and learn. Let’s also continue the informal interactions that make us a community—the study groups, coffee dates, drop-ins just to say hello. In doing so, we will remain connected.

We will come together, from spaces around the world, to meet this new reality. This is who we are. Nothing—not space, nor time—can keep us from moving forward, together.

6 . Larrey, a French military surgeon, attended to the wounded at the battle of Waterloo. On the battlefield, he had to _______which soldiers needed medical attention most urgently,_______ their military rank. In doing so, he came up with triage, a system of _______ between urgent and non-urgent patients. Triage remains as _______ today as it was in the Napoleonic campaigns.

Though most doctors today have _______ been in battlefield conditions, the COVID-19 pandemic has changed that. In Italy there are reports of doctors _______ in hospital hallways because of the _______ they have to make. In America and Europe many doctors are faced with terrible decisions about how to _______ scarce resources such as beds, intensive care, and ventilators(呼吸机).

One general solution is to _______ that resources are directed to the patients who have the greatest ________ of successful treatment, and who have the greatest life expectancy. Take the ________ of ventilators for example. If a young patient arrives needing a ventilator and none are ________, there is a chance that one will be ________ from someone else that is identified as being less likely to survive.

Such framework does not ________ older patients or those with health problems. Italian doctors say that it helps if the framework is decided in ________, and patients and families are ________ informed. Whether on the battlefield or in a ________ ICU, humans tend to treat others according to their need and chances of ________. This framework seems broadly morally ________. Even so, it will involve many heartbroken ________ along the way.

Yours sincerely,

Li Hua