In 2007 Rebecca Goss's newborn daughter, Ella, was diagnosed with Severe Ebstein's Anomaly. A rare and incurable heart condition. She lived for 16 months. Her Birth is a book-length sequence of poems beginning with Ella's birth, her short life and her death, and ending with the joys and complexities that come with the birth of another child. Goss navigates the difficult territory of grief and loss in poems that are spare, tender and haunting: 'Going home, back down / the river road, will be a foreign route without her'.

    Category judge Michael Mackmin, Aylsham-based editor of poetry magazine The Rialto, said: 'I read the book from cover to cover in one go and couldn't keep back the tears. It's the story of the brief life of her first-born, who had an incurable heart disease. "I scoop her from her metal cot and rest / her broken heart on mine."'

    'A raw story told with great clarity and one that eventually takes in the birth of a second child, who lives. Rebecca has terrific self-awareness too- watch out when you get to the poem 'Bench'.'