I’m proud to have poems in Spelt Magazine and Pennine Platform this spring. The continuation of both these lit mags owes much to the tenacity of their editors who have ensured they continue to hit people’s doormats in hard format, despite increasing pressures.
Spelt celebrates issue 10, and there’s a submissions window open for issue 11. What’s the secret? A clarity about its readership (rural communities and people interested in the natural world), beautiful illustrations, accessible short stories and poetry, visual spaciousness. Here’s a copy nesting in Rottingdean public library, looking forward to being read!
Poets in issue 10 include Claire Booker, Carole Bromley, Jane Burn, Harry Gallagher, Jane Mutyora, Katrina Naomi, Joseph Nutman, Lori Pearmain, Maggie Reed, Sara Stegen, Lauren Thomas and Emma Zobel Marshal. Also beautiful prose pieces by Alison Lock and Julia Brigdale, and winning poems from the 2023 Spelt Competition by Kate Caoimhe Arthur (1st prize), Gareth Writer-Davis (2nd prize), and Isabella Mead (3rd prize). And if that’s not enough, QR Codes to two fabulous poetry films by Barry Hollow (Yi’ve Nivver Dee’d Fae a Lichtnin Strike Yit!) and Janet Lees (Blame the Fox based on the Jane Lovell poem). Google Youtube for the first and Vimeo for the second.
And you can watch editors Wendy Pratt and Steve Nash launch Spelt (issue 10) here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAzxIRoViVM If you’d like to hear me read my poem, I appear at 1 hour, 27 minutes. For more details on how to subscribe or submit to the magazine please visit: www.speltmagazine.com
Pennine Platform no 95 is out from editor Julia Deakin. If you’ve ever doubted how hard editors work, Julia’s editorial will lay that to rest: “When I took on the role five years ago . . . I inherited the wish that every poem submitted should be responded to. This February I read and responded individually to 738 poems. For each poem I annotate the hard copy with what I call ‘scribbled musings’, then drafted a letter with a maximum two-line response per poem.” Now that’s what I call heroic commitment.
In this issue you can read work from Mike Barlow, Claire Booker, Matt Bryden, Lydia Harris, Jo Haslam, LB Jorgensen, Julie Lumsden, Julie Maclean, Konstandinos Mahoney, Ian Parks, Chris Preddle, Terry Quinn, Greta Ross, Jayne Stanton and David Underdown, among many others. Subjects range from errant bodies, bones and ripostes, to kitchenalia, deadlines and Belgium. To order a copy or to check out submission windows, please visit: www.pennineplatform.com