She’s a poet and she knows it.

She being Holly Albritton of County Street, that is.

Albritton received a letter late last month from the International Library of Poetry stating that her poem, &uot;My House,&uot; has been picked as a semi-finalist in its International Open Poetry Contest this month.

The prizes for winning could be cash or gifts, including the $1,000 grand prize. Regardless, her poem will published this fall in a book &uot;Letters from the Soul.&uot;

That’s an appropriate title for a book that will house her poem, in which Albritton compares the cleaning to cleaning one’s soul.

My House

In each room

I must look

Under every noon

Do not assume

Cobweb I do see

Dustball

Up and down the halls

Broom do I grab

For it looks pretty drab

I moved like a crab

Picking up as I went

Even though I didn’t know who had sent

Strange things here they came from where

I didn’t know where

Though not for a show

Wither house of wood

House of flesh stood

Clean we must do

For what else are we to do

&uot;It (the poem) wasn’t finished until the time of the contest,&uot; Albritton said. &uot;I asked God for guidance and I finished it when I entered it.

She said that poem is about &uot;our own little cobwebs inside of us that need to be cleaned, not just the physical ones in a house.

&uot;The dustballs represent things that God shows us we need to work on ourselves, which is a day-to-day process, just like housework.

Her poem is being printed for free, but she will pay for the published copy.

The prizes, she insists, were not the motivation; the writing was just for its own sake.

Albritton added that intends to write and publish more.

Aside from writing poetry, Albritton creates personalized gift baskets at her home, and works to make this into a larger business.

She is getting married by the end of this year, and is a member of Trinity Open Door Church on Nansemond Parkway.