The second annual Artsbeijing.com International Poetry Prize was held in Beijing Wednesday with organizers getting stunned after receiving 50,000 entries from all over the country but mostly, from laborers in factories.

The figure is down from last year's contest which received 80,000 submissions, but organizers said the entries this year are a large number by any reckoning.

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Yang Lian, one of the organizers of the event, said many of the most compelling poems were written by factory workers to the surprise of the organizers who said that the factories were the farthest place to become the usual poetry centers of Asia.

"This is the real poetry of real life," Mr. Yang said.

Yang, a poet, left China after the crackdown on democracy protests in Tiananmen in 1989 and sought residence in Berlin and London where he is now based.

He comes freely to China every once in a while and has just edited a Chinese writer's work, an anthology of contemporary Chinese poetry titled "Jade Ladder."

Yang said that with more than 200 million classified as migrant workers, most of the poems spoke of home and their plight as factory workers.

The poems explored the question, "Where is home?" and other nuances of working in factories far away from home.

Yang said factory workers were among the winners both last year and this year.

Wu Niaoniao who  had just lost his factory job  won the first place in this year's contest with his poetry cycle "Rhapsody."

In his speech, Wu said he stood by a conveyor belt in a factory for 11 years, working and at the same time jotting down  notes at the back of a work sheet  which he later transcribed in his dormitory.

The second prize was awarded to Sun Quian, a Muslim whose poetry centered on Sufism and how this resonates with modernity.

The first prize for the anthology category this year went to Shangguan Nanhua for his poetry collection, "Eight Beats of the Ganghou Song."

Shangguan went up the stage and received his prize. Tearing up, he delivered his speech and told his parents, "There is honor in poetry!"

Shangguan was accompanied by his wife and son who is a literature student who looked on him  with pride.

Cash prizes were awarded the winners which included 50,000 yuan (US$8,150) for the first place, 30,000 yuan for second and 10,000 yuan for the third place.

TagsPoetry, factory workers, Beijing Poetry Prize