Sixth Form pupil becomes Winchester College’s first Poet Laureate
Yesterday’s return to the academic year was marked by a service in Winchester Cathedral, but also with a reading by Winchester’s first pupil Poet Laureate.
Following a competitive application process, Sixth Form pupil Tilly was appointed and tasked with writing original verse for Cathedral services and other important occasions in the school calendar.
Her first poem for the start-of-the-year Cathedral service was called ‘Sic Infit’ and was a reflection on the bittersweetness of the turn of the seasons. After considering the sadness of losing what she calls “Our decoratively vaunted summer”, and offering a grim vision of the “arthritic” autumnal landscape, the poem ends by reassuring us that “planted in the womb of the world / is some swollen kernel of hope.” It was a sage and sensitive piece of verse, which offered moving reflections on loss, rebirth, and renewal.
Tilly joined Winchester College in September 2023 and is a literary critic, a member of the prestigious Sixth Book Reading Group and plans to read English at university.
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