{"id":12222,"date":"2016-10-14T14:30:37","date_gmt":"2016-10-14T14:30:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=12222"},"modified":"2020-12-09T15:04:54","modified_gmt":"2020-12-09T15:04:54","slug":"our-pick-of-the-month-for-september-2016-is-leda-meets-helen-by-angharad-walker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/our-pick-of-the-month-for-september-2016-is-leda-meets-helen-by-angharad-walker\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Pick of the Month for September 2016 is ‘Leda Meets Helen’ by Angharad Walker"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

A surge in voting in the final hours saw Angharad Walker just pip her nearest rival at the post with her moving ‘Leda Meets Helen’, a superb example of how much can be said in only a few words.<\/p>\n

Angharad graduated from the University of Warwick with a degree in English Literature and Creative Writing in 2013. She lives and works in London.<\/p>\n

She has asked that her \u00a310 prize be donated to the Pembroke Unit Fund of the Salisbury District Hospital Stars Appeal<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Leda Meets Helen<\/strong><\/p>\n

She is fresh on this globe from my globed belly and I am too scared to look. I dread the moment she opens her eyes. She could have his black beads.<\/p>\n

I unwrap her. Not a feather in sight. I turn her over and over with delight, run my fingers over her human down. Her toes are angular, unwebbed. Her neck cannot hold up her head. Her lips are soft, pink, unfed.<\/p>\n

I will never teach her to swim.<\/p>\n

I will never dress her in white.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

Voters comments included:<\/p>\n

The story behind the brevity is compelling – full of contradictory feelings of fear and attraction. Stunning compression of language. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

A whole world, a whole myth, and what it’s like to greet your newborn, in so few words. A beautiful poem! <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

I like the uncertain direction of the poem. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

It really spoke to my heart.<\/em> <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  A surge in voting in the final hours saw Angharad Walker just pip her nearest rival at the post with her moving ‘Leda Meets Helen’, a superb example of how much can be said in only a few words. Angharad graduated from the University of Warwick with a degree in English Literature and Creative […]<\/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":[135,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2016-poetry-picks","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12222","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=12222"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12222\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23803,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12222\/revisions\/23803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}