To celebrate the launch of A Chime for Manchester, a project to mark the centenary of Manchester Cathedral’s bells and to develop on them for the future, we invited poets to meditate on the theme of ‘Bells’ for our annual poetry competition.

Our judges have read through over 400 individual poems and we can now reveal the winners of the Manchester Cathedral Poetry Competition 2025.

First prize goes to Maximiliano Buss Kopp for his poem Chubut, Chapel Chime, a poem that “transcends language and geography,” says Dean Rogers Govender. “The poet beautifully draws out the bell chimes beyond geography and nations. The distance of Chubut does not silence the bell’s chime in the ‘starlit chapel of his chest’. This has an endless appeal to the transcendent and joy that bells can bring to the human spirit.”

Second prize has been awarded to twelve-year-old Esme Alice Blue for her poem Reaching Out, and third prize to Tessa Pike for Wedding Bells.

This competition was judged by Tom Branfoot, Becky May, Abhijeet Singh and Dean Rogers Govender.

Becky May told us: “We were honoured to receive a large number of entries this year from around the globe, each of which we read closely and carefully. It was fantastic to see the theme interpreted in such a wide variety of ways – from reflections on bells as markers of history to beautifully written accounts of personal connection.”

“Given the attention shown to craft, judging the competition was extremely challenging. Our final selection are the poems that stayed with us, that we returned to, that continued ringing long after the final line.”

A further ten poems were Highly Commended:

Chiwenite Onyekwelu – Bell Theories

Pippa Woo – Peal

Lavinia Liang – The Grand Bell

Sarah Westcott – Small Boy, Ringing

Sean Cho A. – Ring

Gregory Kearns – Metallography

Antony Rowland – Plain Bob

David Lee – When the Ten Rang in D

Daniel Rye – The Bells

Nicky Kippax – Tintinnabulation

Our judges have given an Honourable Mention to Nare Vardumian’s poem Bells. Nare is a sixteen-year-old student from Chuhuiv Lyceum No6, Kharkiv Region, Ukraine.

All are invited to attend the prize ceremony at Manchester Cathedral on Sunday 25th January from 1pm – 4pm, where the winning poets as well as those in the highly commended category will read their poems.

A pamphlet featuring the poems will also be available on the night. If you wish to purchase a copy of the prize winning pamphlet for £5, please email submissions@manchestercathedral.org and we will arrange postage.

Our 2025 winning poem

You can read Maximiliano Buss Kopp’s winning poem below. It will be displayed in Manchester Cathedral’s Nave alongside the second and third prize poems for visitors to read all year round.

Chubut, Chapel Chime

Mimosa, 1865: salt-bitten timbers, hymns softly hummed.

He lands where the Chubut gentles its limed green,

coirón rasps like wire on his boots; the fence sings a thin note.

He learns the light—white that rings on stone;

heat tastes of brass on the tongue.

Goat bells—brief bronzes—braid the brown air of the meseta;

their tin tintinnabulation

tunes the dusk to blue.

He says, “Cofia’r Cymru yn y wlad bell,” and hears it answer:

bell as distant, bell as bell—one word, two metals.

Far is a peal in the ear; distance, a chapel chime.

He opens acequias, sows barley, speaks softly of those

who went ahead on the voyage—

no harsh name for the hush that claimed them.

Sundays, tin roofs tick; the wind carries coal-scent,

and memory—mild as milk, keen as salt—

slips its hand into his: Gaiman not yet named,

Rawson newly hewn, the river a restless ribbon.

The steppe’s dry choir hums; a ewe coughs; a kid calls.

And in the small, starlit chapel of his chest

the bells begin again—

Cofia’r Cymru yn y wlad bell—

far, ringing, here.