Amid over 1,000 poetry submissions, Walthamstow’s Tusshara Nalakumar Srilatha won the adult prize for her poem Turn Back the Day, writes Paul McGrane
The Waltham Forest Poetry Competition is run by the Forest Poets Stanza (Walthamstow) and has been running annually since 2018.
Lorraine Mariner, our 2025 judge, read over 1,000 poems to discover our fantastic winners.
Each poem was sent in anonymously so Lorraine had no idea who the writers were. Our theme this year was WEATHER / WHETHER and we received poems from nearly 600 poets – not only from Waltham Forest and the UK but also 26 other countries around the world including New Caledonia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Vietnam.
Lorraine: “Thank you to everyone who submitted a poem, for discovering that you had a weather poem to send in or for writing a new poem. I was deluged in poetry but when I discovered a poem that really spoke to me or took me by surprise, it was like a break in the cloud of words and a glimpse of sunlit language.”
The local prizes, for poets who live, work or study in Waltham Forest, were kindly sponsored by Stow Brothers.
The adult prize was awarded in December at the standing-room only Trades Hall to Walthamstow’s Tusshara Nalakumar Srilatha for her poem Turn Back the Day. This is the second time in a row that Tusshara has won the prize, a remarkable achievement considering that we had a completely different judge last year.
Tusshara said: “This poem was inspired by my last few days studying in Buenos Aires. It was early 2020 and I had planned to be there until the summer. But as the pandemic developed, and travel restrictions loomed, I quickly booked a flight home to be with family.
“What followed was a surreal 48 hours of packing, abrupt goodbyes, and walking around the neighbourhood in disbelief. This poem explores the yearning that I felt for more time in the city.”
Poetry judge Lorraine said: “I was drawn in by the unexpected image this poem opens with – sunshine as soup – and how the images continue to build, surprising word combinations creating a sensuous, unique language. The speaker of the poem is a vampire in reverse, longing for sunlight and the peace this brings them. But there is weather anxiety too as they venture out into “my leaking city”, and a sense of decay. A surprising poem expressing hope and fear, searching for glimpses of nature in the urban landscape.”
The young poet prize was won by Fatima Sara Dar for The Great Stink. Fatima, from Leytonstone, is eleven and her inspiration for the poem came from her cat Roya, whose cat litter made a great stink (‘The naughty little traitor/Mischief-making creator!’). For many of her stories, poems and artwork, inspiration came from Roya.
Lorraine explained: “It was great to read a poem that took a historic weather event and applied it to a beloved, somewhat prickly pet. I loved the rhymes of this poem and felt the speaker’s pain at this terrible smell!”
You can read all the winning poems here
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