The Rules
Each country is represented by one poem; all poems must previously have been published in The Missing Slate (poems that have also appeared elsewhere will remain eligible).
For the first round, the countries have been drawn in alphabetical order. The first in the alphabet (Bangladesh) plays the last (Venezuela), and so on. In the second round, the winner of the opening match will play the winner of the second match, and so on.
The winner of each match will be decided by The Missing Slate‘s readers a poll on the magazine’s website, located at the foot of each individual match page. (Please note: for the opening two matches, it was also possible to vote on the magazine’s facebook page. The voting process has now been streamlined to avoid potential confusion over two separate sets of results.)
Each match will run for exactly 24 hours, beginning at midday Pakistan time (PKT; GMT+4 hours). After 24 hours, the poem with the most votes will be declared the winner and will go through to the next round.
In the event of a tie, the match will go to a “golden vote”. The poem that receives the first vote after midday PKT will be the winner.
In the event of any dispute over the result, the decision of The Missing Slate‘s editors must be regarded as final.
