The 18th edition of Poetry & All That Jazz was launched at the Chichester Festival, featuring sixty poets including renowned figures like Michael Bartholomew-Biggs and Naomi Foyle. Edited by Barry Smith and published by Focus Arts in collaboration with the Poetry & Jazz Cafe, copies are available at various festivals and online. Next year's anthology will accept submissions starting in April 2026. Additionally, the website Words For The Wild, created by Amanda Oosthuisen and Louise Taylor, promotes local nature awareness and fundraising, showcasing poetry, including a piece by the author on War and Peace, alongside other contributors.

I'm super chuffed my poem 'Whitsun Kids' is a winner in The Poetry Society Members' Poems Competition this summer, alongside poems by Jill Hopper, Tim Kiely, Alex McCrickard, Laura Mizrachi and Jane Wilkinson. A big thank you to judge Andre Bagoo for selecting it. And as if publication in Poetry News wasn't enough, I opened the Poetry Society's on-line newsletter to discover 'Whitsun Kids had been made poem of the month.

This month I have poems in two magazines with a definite fondness for rhyme. It's good to know there's a corner of the poetry world that welcomes what some consider old-fashioned sonic tricks. That said, my two poems in Orbis don't use end-rhyme, and the poem in Light Up Online is only four lines long! Orbis, edited by Carole Baldock, is as much a community as a literary magazine.

I'm delighted to have a poem in Channel's 12th issue, with its exquisite cover by Angela Duffy and a lithesome array of fine poetry and prose. Highlights for me include stunning work by Patrick Deeley, Mai Ishikawa, Catriona Lane, Rhona McAdam and Niamh Twomey. In Notes from the Editors, Cassia Gaden Gilmartin explains that "Channel is born, in part, from the conviction that there is no absolute divide between the political and the aesthetic.

Issue 97 of Pennine Platform is out, with three of my poems and excellent work from poets such as Anna Bowles, Rachel Carney, LB Jorgensen, Kate Noakes, D A Prince, Ed Reiss and Paul Stephenson.

The Slowdown is a daily podcast of poetry and reflection hosted by poet and academic Major Jackson, who recently included my poem Cinema Paradiso. His gorgeous reading voice, together with his insightful editorials on each poem, make this a delight to welcome into your inbox each day.

My poem 'Kimono Recycled' appeared in The Spectator earlier this month. A big thank you to Hugo Williams for choosing it. You can read it here at: The Feb 1st issue contains poems by Stewart Conn, Jamie McKendrick and Claire Booker. It's heartening that poetry can still appear in mainstream publications. The Books & Arts section in particular is consistently strong, including pieces on Plato's…