Are you a secret poet? Do you know it? Well, hide your light under a bushel no longer because it’s time for our Burns Night Poetry Competition 2022. You could win a bottle of Glengoyne 21 Year Old. Runners up will receive Darkness Islay 12 Year Old and a Regions of Scotland whisky tasting set, or an Aerolite Lyndsay 10 Year Old Islay single malt.

You know those moments in meetings when the sensible people run out of things to say? That’s normally the opportunity for the others to propose outlandish ideas which will be tactfully shot down or crack jokes that nobody quite gets. Well, that’s how our Burns Night Poetry Competition started back in 2019. There was a lull in a meeting to discuss how we should cover Burns Night, a big event in the whisky calendar, somebody said ‘poetry competition’, and much to everyone’s surprise, we went ahead and did it.

Even more surprising is how successful it’s been. Every year we get dozens of entries, and, though some of them are awful – rhyming ‘whisky’ with ‘frisky’ is a giveaway – there’s always some that show real talent. Just take a look at the winning entries from 2019,  2020, and 2021.

Burns Night Poetry Competition 2022

Prizes for poetry, but only if you wow us…

Enter our Burns Night Poetry Competition 2022

This year we’ve upgraded the prizes so we’re expecting an even higher standard than previous years. The winner will receive a bottle of  Glengoyne 21 year old single malt worth over £140. The second place prize is a bottle of Islay 12 Year Old Oloroso Cask Finish (Darkness) and a Regions of Scotland Whisky Tasting Set. And there’s a very nice bottle for the third-place entry, a bottle of Aerolite Lyndsay 10 Year Old – The Character of Islay Whisky Company. 

Some tasty whiskies there. All you have to do is write a poem in either English or Scots of 25 lines or less. No epics, please. Apart from those rules, you can do what you like: write in blank verse, use iambic pentameters, or come up with something totally experimental. Again, just don’t rhyme ‘whisky’ with ‘frisky.’ 

To get you in the mood, here’s a little something from the Bard himself, Robbie Burns:

‘My heart’s in the Highlands, my heart is not here;
My heart’s in the Highlands, a-chasing the deer;
A-chasing the wild-deer and following the roe,
My heart’s in the Highlands, wherever I go.’

Stirring stuff!

The 2021 MoM Burns Night poetry competition is open to entrants 18 years and over with postage to UK addresses only. Entries accepted from 12:00 GMT on 3 January to 12:00 GMT 17 January 2022. Full T&Cs are below, but to enter simply email us at [email protected], or comment on Facebook, Instagram, or below with your poem by 17 January. The winner will be announced on Burns Night, Tuesday 25 January.

View Full Terms and Conditions.