In today’s stories, we delve into the world of poetry and social media to take a look at the anonymous Instagram poet, look at what inspires the winner of the 2017 Kundiman Poetry Prize and we explore the unusual collaboration between athleticism and poetry.

Atticus – The Instagram Poet

The rise of social media has made it possible for poetry to reach more people than ever before; easily accessible, current and for the most part short, a new breed of poet has taken to Instagram and his name is Atticus.

And that is almost everything that he has chosen to share with his Instagram audience, his name; for the most part, he prefers to remain anonymous. He is a 20 something man from the West coast of Canada, and that is as much personal information as he will share. His poetry is unconventional, he certainly doesn’t follow any of the rules. In part that is down to his chosen platform, Instagram opens poetry in a completely new way, and he has been able to make a career posting his very short poems. So much so that he has gained a following of around 400,000 people.

Keen to take his poetry in a new direction, and show that he isn’t just a man of few words he has put together a poetry book. The book which is titled “Love Her Wild” contains a mixture of poems, some short and some long. And he doesn’t plan to stop there, Atticus claims there are more books in the pipeline.

2017 Kundiman Poetry Prize Winner

Adeeba Shahid Talukder has been selected to receive the 2017 Kundiman Poetry Prize. Talukder who was born in Pakistan moved to the United States in the late 80’s as a baby. She was brought up in an Urdu speaking household, it was a language that she grew to hate as she spoke it exclusively until she entered kindergarten. At school, she was teased by her peers, whilst other Urdu speakers didn’t want to speak to her because it was considered uncool. It wasn’t until she was asked to translate a poem into Urdu that she became aware of the poetic culture attached to the Urdu language.

Her manuscript “Shahr-e-jaanaan: The City of The Beloved” which is expected to be published late 2018 or early 2019 as part of the prize has significant influences of Urdu poetic traditions. In many ways, her journey to accept both her heritage and the language that she was brought up speaking has come full circle.

Women Athletes Stories Told Through Poetry

During the Rio Olympics, Under Armour, an American sportwear manufacturer, noticed a disturbing trend; women athletes who did well were immediately compared to men. From these observations an unlikely ad campaign, “Unlike Any” was created. The campaign which has just been officially launched paired 5 athletes:

The poets:

were given a brief to capture each athlete in poetry. The results were then captured on film and have produced 5 short adverts that perfectly capture the essence of each athlete and her sport. An unlikely match, maybe but the results speak for themselves and this just shows poetry has its place in every aspect of life.