London: A love-struck pensioner has come up trumps in a poetry contest with a difference: the poems had to be written in ''text speak''.
Eileen Bridge, 68, a grandmother, from Accrington, Lancashire, won 350 pounds in the ''txt laureate'' competition, after she took second place with an ode to her husband of six months.
The entry read: ''O hart tht sorz, My luv adorz, He mAks me liv, He mAks me giv, Myslf 2 him, As my luv porz.'' The retired teacher was only beaten by London law student Ben Ziman-Bright, 23, who scooped the top prize of ₤1,000.
He wrote: ''Not even the wet rustle of rain can dampen today. Your text buoys me above oil-rainbow puddles like a paper boat, so that even soaked to the skin, I am grinning.''
The contest, started by mobile phone operator T-Mobile, was judged by Luke Wright, who took his debut show ''Luke Wright, Poet Laureate'' to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival last year.
He said: ''Ben was easily the winner because of things like his contrast of the 'oil-rainbow' puddles, which is poetic and abstract.
''Then his last line about 'grinning' brings the poem right back down to earth.
''Overall, there were a lot of funny poems -- good to know Britain still has a wicked sense of humour.''
More than 200 entrants across the country submitted over 300 text poems of less than 160 characters.
T-Mobile set out to find Britain's ''txt laureate'' after research showed that 46 per cent of people crave flirty text messages and 40 per cent cherish mobile love messages by keeping them on their handset.
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