❛ I think that artists provide questions, not answers. We provide provocations rather than fully formed objects. Painter Kehindle Wiley, who was born #OTD in 1977.

❛ Today, as I leave this house, you ask, with a teenagerish / grin, if I'm having an affair. In the exact same way you ask if I've / sorted the recycling. Today's #ThrowbackThursday comes from Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana, with poem 'Body Language', from Issue 46.

'Rustic but cosy, pared-back but comfortable, and full of eclectic touches' Irish Times Quiet, welcoming accommodation for writers and artists of all disciplines in beautiful Cavan – come and work on your next project somewhere truly inspiring...

❛ First forget inspiration. Habit is more dependable. Habit will sustain you whether you're inspired or not. Habit will help you finish and polish your stories. Inspiration won't. Habit is persistence in practice. Octavia Butler, who died #OTD in 2006.

❛ I really think I write about everyday life... Life is intrinsically, well, boring and dangerous at the same time. At any given moment the floor may open up. Of course, it almost never does; that's what makes it so boring. Edward Gorey, born #OTD in 1925.

Fish Friday, anyone? 🐡 Painting by Moth Art Prize winner Blanca Amorós, who featured on the cover of Issue 47.

❛ How to survive as a reasonably intact human being undamaged by popular preconceptions and misconceptions? It has been a long uphill battle. Filmmaker and artist Derek Jarman, who died #OTD in 1994.

A Tuesday throwback to our interview with the brilliant June Caldwell, from Issue 30! More wisdom this way: bit.ly/pastmoths

This week's Moth Studios Challenge is to produce a painting / drawing of a chair. The work must be completed within two hours and submitted from 9-11pm on Tuesday evening to The Moth Studios (by private message on FB). The challenge is open to everyone. Please share and good luck! 🎨 Jason Line

Could YOU write a poem that kids would love? The Caterpillar Poetry Prize is currently open for entries – with up to €1,000 and a trip to The Moth Retreat up for grabs. Closing 31 March, so there's still plenty of time to try out something new: bit.ly/tcpp26 🎨 Quentin Blake

Happy Valentine's Day, friends of The Moth! While you've caught us feeling sentimental, share your favourite love poem in the comments below... We'll start, with a Frank O'Hara classic. 💌💌💌

❛ You say: this season is so cloud-heavy, so like breathing lead, / So like enduring, lightless for longer, the days brittle, hard. The late Fred Johnston's final poem from The Moth, 'Conjuring' (Issue 50). 🌥

❛ Writing breaks open the vaults of the dead and the skies behind which the prophesying angels hide. The mind makes and makes, spinning its web. Sylvia Plath, who died #OTD in 1963.

Crawling through the week... 'Child's Play' by Swedish artist Markus Åkesson, which originally featured in Issue 20. 🕷️ #MothArchives

This week's Moth Studios Challenge is to produce a painting/drawing which includes a pair of spectacles. Complete within two hours and submit from 9-11pm on Tuesday evening to The Moth Studios (by private message on FB). Please share and good luck! 🎨 Mary Bergherr

❛ Poetry, for me, is the answer to, 'How does one stay sane when private lives are being ransacked by public events?' It's something that hangs over your head all the time. Pulitzer prize-winning poet, Lisel Mueller, born #OTD in 1924.

❛ I wouldn’t view it as a personal humiliation if I stopped making a living from my writing... it wouldn’t feel like, oh no, the world is disregarding me and my blazing talent. There are so many authors I admire who have a day job. From our interview with Naoise Dolan...

❛ I have the gift of neither the spoken nor the written word... Whoever wants to know something about me ought to look carefully at my pictures and try and see in them what I am and what I want to do. Gustav Klimt, who died #OTD in 1918.

Have you written a poem you think kids might love? The Caterpillar Poetry Prize is an annual prize for unpublished poems written by adults for children aged 7–11. Every year since 2015, The Caterpillar Poetry Prize has been awarded to a single poem by a single judge...

❛ To all the devils, lusts, passions, greeds, envies, loves, hates, strange desires, enemies ghostly and real, the army of memories, with which I do battle — may they never give me peace. Writer Patricia Highsmith, who died #OTD in 1995.

'The Moth is a friend to the bright' Joshua Cohen Fancy testing the waters before you take the plunge? You can grab any back issue of The Moth now, from just €5, including P&P. 🌥 bit.ly/pastmoths

❛ February, month of despair, / with a skewered heart in the centre. / I think dire thoughts, and lust for French fries / with a splash of vinegar. Favourite poems to welcome in February this #SharingSunday? We'll start with one by Margaret Atwood. Share in the comments! 🐈‍⬛

❛ You might say I lead a double life. Or a triple or multiple life. In fact, outside my studio, I am not who I pretend to be. There is no showing who one really is. Artist Dorothea Tanning, who died #OTD in 2012.

❛ I need a few months to live scuzzy to finish a book, you know, to not wash my hair, to just sit in the same room for hours and eat with my hands... From our interview with author Claire Kilroy, originally in Issue 13: bit.ly/pastmoths

Half way there... #HumpDayVibe Gaël Davrinche from Issue 36, with 'Under the Skin'

❛ One of the deep secrets of life is that all that is really worth the doing is what we do for others. Lewis Carroll, who was born #OTD in 1832.

❛ What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn't happen much, though. J. D. Salinger, who died #OTD in 2010.

This week's Moth Studios Challenge is to produce a portrait of a friend/family member. Complete your artwork within 2 hours and submit to The Moth Studios (via Facebook DM) submitted from 9-11pm on Tuesday evening. Open to everyone. Please share and good luck! 🎨 Edward Le Bas

❛ dream / of Yorkshire fog and lilacs and the dark salt sea / but even if you die here, you won't belong here. Aniqah Choudhri's 'The Unloving Ground', winner of The Moth Poetry Prize 2021.

This #SharingSaturday, we'd love to see your favourite poems for the month of January in the comments. We'll start first, with one we like from Alex Dimitrov.

❛ I don’t believe in an art that is not born out of man’s need to open his heart. Painter Edvard Munch, who died #OTD in 1944.

Perfect for a grey Wednesday — 'The Sky is White as Clay' by American artist Lu Cong, originally from Issue 5. ☁️ #MothArchives

❛ Experimentation is the key. I believe that there are sounds we have not heard. I believe that there are colors we have not seen. And I believe that there are feelings yet to be felt. Artist Jack Whitten, who died #OTD in 2018.

The theme of this week's Moth Studios Challenge is Greenland. Complete your artwork within 2 hours and submit to The Moth Studios (via Facebook DM) from 9-11pm on Tuesday evening. The challenge is open to everyone. Please share and good luck! 🎨 Kent Rockwell

❛ I think I was just always extremely naively optimistic about what I could personally achieve... probably better that I didn’t understand how the industry was structured. I didn’t know enough to be intimidated by it. From our interview with Sally Rooney, from Issue 30. #MothArchives

❛ I invent everything in my painting. And I stylize whatever it was that I saw or felt. Brazilian painter Tarsila do Amaral, who died #OTD in 1973.

‘There are numerous high-quality literary journals being published in Ireland, but surely none is more gorgeous than The Moth. I always go straight for the interviews’ Rob Doyle Iconic interviews from Sally Rooney, Sharon Olds, Kit de Waal, and more. 💚 bit.ly/pastmoths

Open now! 🌟 The Caterpillar Poetry Prize is an annual prize for unpublished poems written by adults for children aged 7–11. We are delighted to have Robert Schechter as this year's judge. 1st prize: €1,000 + a week at The Moth Retreat Closes 31 March: bit ly/tcpp26

❛ If you do not breathe through writing, if you do not cry out in writing, or sing in writing, then don't write, because our culture has no use for it. French writer Anaïs Nin, who died #OTD in 1977.

❛ we still have that brecht quote the darkness the singing / devastation brings its own kind of beauty New year optimism, courtesy of Wye Haze, from Issue 46. 🔥 #MothArchives

The Moth Studios Challenge is back! This week's theme, the first of 2026, is power. Complete your artwork within 2 hours and submit from 9-11pm on Tuesday evening to The Moth Studios (via Facebook DM). Open to all. Please share and good luck! 🎨 George Bellows

❛ The more you fail, the more you succeed. It is only when everything is lost and - instead of giving up - you go on, that you experience the momentary prospect of some slight progress. Sculptor Alberto Giacometti, who died #OTD in 1966.

❛ The world is beautiful but not sayable. That's why we need art. Poet Charles Simic, who died #OTD in 1923.

❛ It’s nice to go home and say, oh, so and so gave me a good review, and to have everyone be like, who? From our interview with Seán Hewitt, Issue 47.

Sliding on into a New Year... Tor-Arne Moen's 'Change of Weather', from Issue 42. 🏔 #MothArchives

❛ There should be someone to talk to. But because such a person is not there in our life, that’s why we need to paint. Artist Yoshitomo Nara, born #OTD in 1959.

❛ We ate / apples until winter. Were you / expecting snow? And now / there's falling in all their graves Taylor Supplee's poem 'Vanishing', from Issue 31 ❄️ #MothArchives

New year's resolution to work on your writing or try something new? Why not check out our interviews with the likes of Sally Rooney, Simon Armitage, Evie Wyld, Helen Oyeyemi, Colm Toibin, and Eimear McBride for inspiration... ✨ bit.ly/pastmoths

Burning the old year with this fab poem by Naomi Shihab Nye and welcoming in the first weekend of 2026. 🎆

Final chance – one of the world's biggest prizes for a single poem closes midnight, your time, wherever you are! 🌟 €11,000 in prizes up for grabs. Judged by Ishion Hutchinson. bit.ly/mothpoetry25