{"id":10031,"date":"2016-01-13T16:15:16","date_gmt":"2016-01-13T16:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=10031"},"modified":"2020-12-09T15:02:10","modified_gmt":"2020-12-09T15:02:10","slug":"and-the-final-pick-of-the-month-for-2015-is-the-alchemist-by-james-parris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/and-the-final-pick-of-the-month-for-2015-is-the-alchemist-by-james-parris\/","title":{"rendered":"And the final Pick of the Month for 2015 is \u2018The Alchemist\u2019 by James Parris"},"content":{"rendered":"

We can now announce that December’s ‘Pick of the Month’, and our final one for 2015, is James Parris’ ‘The Alchemist’ which featured on the first day of our ‘Twelve Days of Christmas’ series. James <\/strong>writes from East London and has only just begun to turn his mind to poetry.<\/p>\n

James will receive a copy of our Christmas anthology TWELVE: Slanted Poems for Christmas<\/em><\/a> and has asked that his prize (\u00a310) is donated to St Martin-in-the-Fields<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Alchemist<\/strong><\/p>\n

The house was strange without one.
\nCorners where it could be swelled
\ndaily in their emptiness
\nand threatened to topple the festivity.<\/p>\n

Contrary under her gaze, he determined
\nthat a squat bought thing just wouldn\u2019t do,
\nand, shedding skeptics,
\npicked me as acolyte for misadventure.<\/p>\n

And so in speckled overalls, like skins,
\ntreading dampness into itself,
\nwe left Crosby-carolling
\nfor the trees who shivered at garden\u2019s end<\/p>\n

and saw in hand and hand on trunk,
\nhe hoisted me into the twiggy innards
\nand spiced stench of sap
\nto amputate a branch or two or three<\/p>\n

that we might puzzle together
\nin counterfeit of Christmas.
\nMetal teeth chattered bark to pulp
\nuntil my knuckles roared.<\/p>\n

Then on the grass he laid our loot
\nand crouched and bent and sculpted,
\nrehearsing imperfect forms
\ngloveless, beneath the limbs\u2019 original,<\/p>\n

and twisting out an edifice, like origami
\npatterned from some secret
\nblueprint, invisible to me,
\nhe stood content over his design.<\/p>\n

Inside, we propped our patchwork nature,
\nboughs shot out like a mad star,
\nwhere he hoped it might not
\nshout its own lie loud enough<\/p>\n

for her to tear it all to pieces.
\nStill, she came, and stood, and, silent,
\ncircumspected for a hanging second.
\nAnd she smiled.<\/p>\n

From one angle it was almost a tree.
\nBut from every side his alchemy
\nnow seemed to warm the house,
\nfuller in its strangeness.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Voters made the following comments:<\/p>\n

The wonderful use of words that give it such a unique rhythm but mostly the sentiment and the pleasure the alchemist finally brings. <\/em><\/p>\n

I liked the idea of building a Christmas tree and it being perfect despite its imperfections <\/em><\/p>\n

For it’s extreme originality.<\/em><\/p>\n

The most well-written, insightful poem of the list. <\/em><\/p>\n

Subtle, understated, great word-pictures – like “knuckles roared”. <\/em><\/p>\n

This gets my vote because to me it symbolises families coming together at Christmas.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Comments on the rest of the shortlist included:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Lana Bella, Eleven Years Tasted Like a Thousand Year Old Chinese Egg<\/p>\n

I liked the mystery in this.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Joanne Key, Watching Tai Chi in the Park in December<\/p>\n

Loved the initial apparent simplicity of this poem, then it moves and weaves to become multi layered and full of depth.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sally Long, The Door<\/p>\n

Like the door,it opened my mind<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Wendy Pratt, Undone<\/p>\n

This one left me undone x<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Andrew Turner, My father’s watch<\/p>\n

I love the way the poet has described the passage of time inside the ‘carefully imagined tin’.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We can now announce that December’s ‘Pick of the Month’, and our final one for 2015, is James Parris’ ‘The Alchemist’ which featured on the first day of our ‘Twelve Days of Christmas’ series. James writes from East London and has only just begun to turn his mind to poetry. James will receive a copy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[139],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2015-poetry-picks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10031"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10035,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10031\/revisions\/10035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}