Invisibility: instead of thinking, no one’s interested in my poetry, I remember that delicious time of quietly cooking up a book which no one has yet read. I am working on a collection in the dark, there is solace in this. No one has noticed yet, because it’s too early.
Another one for your diaries: will be at @lyrafest.com on Sunday 26 April, in the fine company of Romalyn Ante, Katrina Naomi, Chris Emery, and Natalie Linh Bolderston. It'd be fab to see you, come through: www.headfirstbristol.co.uk/whats-on/wat...
Thank you to Michael Simms for publishing my poem ‘Black Jaguar with Quai Saint Bernard’ on Vox Populi. This poem was my first published in Poetry magazine, in 2014, and is in my 6th collection Fauverie. Aramis was in the Fauverie then and only 2 years old.
voxpopulisphere.com?fbclid=IwVER...
Poems can take time to materialise. I felt there wasn’t hope for a poem I wrote 2 years ago, responding to a sculpture in Lausanne Art Brut collection, trying to capture how it made me feel. But two evenings ago it suddenly expanded into one I’m happy with. I had a fresh angle. Never give up hope
Bad Betty Live photos from last Friday night, my Nottingham reading from Beast, photo credits to Jade Pharoah. Huge thanks to Jake & Amy at Bad Betty Press and host Bridie Squires, all performers were 🔥
On #worldbookday I’m celebrating 10 books I’ve published since I was 44 – 9 poetry collections +1 novel.4 were shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize, 1 for Forward Prize, 1 won Laurel & RSL Ondaatje Prize. 2 shortlisted for WBoTY So if you’re in your forties wondering if it will ever happen – it can
It’s okay to take time out from writing, to just live and rest, do other work, let your imagination breathe.
@resurgencetrust.bsky.social
@bloodaxebooks.bsky.social
Animals and healing at Resurgence TONIGHT
Wednesday 25 February • 7—8.30pm GMT • via Zoom
Pascale Petit’s work demonstrates poetry as a kind of shamanism, allowing author and reader to shapeshift. Jay Griffiths’ new book is How Animals Heal Us
Buy a FREE ticket
www.tickettailor.com/events/there...
if we really loved people we wouldn’t let so many suffer – I am sure our work on earth is to learn love and empathy. Art and poetry helps us in that goal as it’s made from an impulse of love and wonder of the world
Beast is going to Nottingham! I’ll be reading for Bad Betty Live at the New Art Exchange 6pm Friday 20 March, with Wayne Holloway-Smith, Malaika Kegode, Rick Dove and Hilário Alves.
www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/bad-betty-...
Have you ever seen a rare and critically endangered Amur leopard cub? Here is Zeya with her mum Lena in the special @dartmoorzoo.bsky.social She is so playful! Spent a magical sunny day watching her and many other treasures, friends I took a few days’ holiday at last
A group of Buddhist monks has finally reached Washington, D.C., on foot, completing a 15-week trek for peace from Texas apnews.com/article/budd...
Excited to share the striking cover of PAIN SONGS by Daniel Sluman. Lyrical, confessional poems exploring the experience of chronic pain & disability, fertility & pregnancy, the ways the body & the world interact & intersect.
Ready to pre-order now, out in May.
ninearchespress.com/publications...
A big thank you @betarish.bsky.social for a very encouraging review of Beast in Under the Radar Issue 36! The flight issue looks ♥️ and can be ordered here:
ninearchespress.ecwid.com/Under-the-Ra...
@ninearchespress.bsky.social @bloodaxebooks.bsky.social
Reviews of Rachael Boast's Versus Versus anthology and of recent poetry collections by @jesstraynor.bsky.social and @pascalepetit.bsky.social feature in Issue 36 of Under the Radar. With thanks to reviewers @julwe1.bsky.social, @jennywcreative.bsky.social, @betarish.bsky.social.
A poem Salt Bride from my ninth collection, Beast, published by @bloodaxebooks.bsky.social last April, inspired by the sculpture Salt Bride by Sigalit Landau. Thank you to everyone who has reviewed and read and who invited me to their venues and festivals — it took five years to write.
what a great photo! with George, Ian and Zain, looking forward to the episode xx
Me being utterly astonished at the beauty of the work in Zain Rishi’s pamphlet Noon published by The Emma Press. It’s well worth reading.
Thank you Jennifer x, hope you have a gorgeous evening
I shan’t be there sadly as I’ll be teaching an online Arvon week that Friday. Very sad.
We live just under Bodmin Moor and in a granite cottage 💚
I have The Granite Kingdom love it and I live in granite
Poetry is the closest grief has to expression in language. Without it, we would be reduced to a single, unending cry of inexpressible hurt. With it, we exercise our prerogative to be human, in conversation with a grief that would otherwise destroy us.
– Ilyse Kusnetz
Creative power is magical – time stops when in the throes of writing a poem. Afterwards I stop and glance at the clock – an hour passed in a frozen second. What does the process do to the mind? Are there pockets of eternity in its fabric?
writing poems is a form of resistance and protest. Being quiet, listening and looking at the natural world and channeling it is a protest against anti-spiritual forces and noise. Perceiving Earth as one being is a protest against war.
When you feel desperate and hopeless try to write a poem. It doesn’t have to be good, because you’ll try it again until one line is alive enough to keep you alive.
🙏🏽 thank you x
Happy New Year to all! Let’s hope for the best for 2026, here is a hopeful poem from Beast.
