This post below contextualizes a truly exceptional essay published in the BMJ Medical Humanities. (link therein) The "lyrical essay" combines prose, poetry, memoir & statistics into a powerful vehicle centering two CSA survivors' voices. Its powerful & distressing - its the voices we need to hear.

The starting point: how is child sexual abuse represented in the arts, if indeed it is represented at all? Looking for ourselves in books, films, plays, visual arts, and music is a human thing. We look outward as ways of looking inward.We look outward to reflect upon our own lives and experiences.

A new blog post, with news of a lyric essay published in BMJ Medical Humanities. Proud of this. clarebest.co.uk/2026/04/21/s...

Finally made it to the V&A East Storage where I swooned at the Frankfurt Kitchen. These were designed by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky for German social housing in 1926 and were the forerunner of the ‘fitted kitchen’. Such beautiful simplicity. #V&A #frankfurtkitchen #london #architecture #design

A bump for this guest @northseapoets.bsky.social post. I've always loved this Auden poem and I have always loved the notion of an imaginary friend. So here I am writing about both: open.substack.com/pub/northsea...

Wouldn’t it be something if Royal Lodge, Windsor, could become a retreat / shelter for victim survivors of #sexualabuse and #sexualassault? #survivorsvoices #CSA #rapecrisis #survivor #SA #DV #MeToo

Submissions are now open for issue nine. The theme is Trespass: rights and wrongs; encroachment and colonisation; faults and forgiveness. Please see the website (link in bio) for information and guidelines. Window closes August 31st. 🕊 xx

Gorgeous miniature binding by Gabrielle Fox of my poem ‘The bookbinder’ - what a gift! #finebookbinding #miniaturebooks

buzz buzz 💚

New post on #Substack from @johnglenday.bsky.social Robert Frost's Eyebrows – John Glenday on words, syllables and cadence. #NorthSeaPoets #PoetryCommunity

Competition - Win copies of new book 'Bowie Land - Walking In The Footsteps of David' by Peter Carpenter.

little brushes of larch 💚

North Sea Poets is shaping up to be a vital new collaborative poetry project. Writing on their #Substack at northseapoets.substack.com is superb. How could it not be when NSP is written/run by Kathleen Jamie, Niall Campbell, Don Paterson, Karen Solie, John Glenday, Lisa Brockwell, Lesley Harrison.

My next book, INTO BEING: will be published by MUP in October and I can now share the cover - it is part memoir, part teaching manual for those of you who love writing. It is one of the only books in the UK to focus on the craft of #memoir. Pre-order manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9781526179258/

Special offer from Longbarrow Press: any 3 hardbacks for £32. Includes collections by Steve Ely, Angelina D'Roza, Rob Hindle, Peter Riley, Nancy Gaffield, Mark Goodwin, Matthew Clegg, Fay Musselwhite, 'The Footing' anthology, and more longbarrowpress.com/current-publ...

Yesterday made a ⚡️ trip to Lewes to hear Neil Gower talk for LewesLitSoc about a life’s work with graphic art, books, maps, + his own writing. So moving to see Neil’s art for ‘The Missing List’ among the images projected. I love what he created & I’m so happy to have his painting on my study wall.

My review of Robert Hamberger’s latest collection – for The Friday Poem open.substack.com/pub/thefrida...

Tomorrow!

Wishing you a happy mid February, with the help of the five-year-olds of Keswick. kimmoore30.substack.com/p/love-and-o...

Love continues. Poem by Robert Hershon (1936-2021) originally published in Poetry Northwest, Autumn 2000.

A single word can be a lie. For example, journalists are still calling what Musk and his child army have been doing an operation in pursuit of government efficiency.... www.meditationsinanemergency.com/to-use-their...

this is my mother’s cloth tape measure, and the embroidered felt case (complete with tiny button and button loop!) that she made as a schoolgirl in the mid-1930s… a wonderful small reminder of an age of handmade detail in everyday objects – bringing so much pleasure still 😌

This is what should be on every front page right now. What's happening in the US right now is an illegal power grab by a private citizen. IT'S A COUP. It's a digital coup. It's Musk who's leading it. The consequences are terrifying. And it's coming for us next. 1/ open.substack.com/pub/broligar...

The Bridport Prize is offering two fully funded writer residencies in Dorset for writers from The Midlands and/or The North West of the UK who are working class and/or 60+ From Sunday 22 to Friday 27 June 2025. Writers must be available for the whole period. Details in link. Please share :)

Things feel quite grim in the world. Poetry, as with much else, is battered by the elements: the doers struggle against the odds, while our thinkers are befuddled. But you know what? Bad Lilies returns later this month and we start typesetting TOMORROW. 😎

Since everybody seems to be talking about blurb culture in publishing this week, I wrote about a few memorable poetry blurbs someflowerssoon.substack.com/p/pinks-27-a...

I had the sweetest dream last night. I was driving on the LIE and there was Donald Trump in a red jumpsuit, picking up trash beside the highway.

Delighted to be one of the judges for The London Library's Emerging Writers Programme; masterclasses, networking peer support and year's membership to the library. Give it a go. More deets: www.londonlibrary.co.uk/about-us/ll-...

Delicious variety & new collaborations celebrating poetry. If you haven’t already, join our newsletter via our website for details on featured events, workshops and poets. It’s the best way to keep up to date on what’s when who and why.

The meanings of the word for a wren, from eight different languages... 8. Little walnut (Bulgarian) 7. Little bird in the ditch (Japanese) 6. Thumbling (Finnish) 5. Fence-skedaddler (Danish) 4. Fence-master (Hebrew) 3. Druid bird (Irish) 2. Mouse-brother (Faroese) 1. Little king of winter (Dutch)

15 years since HappenStance published ‘Treasure Ground’ - my first poetry pamphlet. On 11 Dec it’ll be 18 years since my risk-reducing bilateral mastectomies, wh inspired ‘Excisions’ (Waterloo Press 2011) & ‘Breastless’ (Pighog 2011). Gratitude: a powerful emotion. I declare it here, today. 🙏🏻

Today’s poem is called ‘How to Avoid Mixing Your Metaphors’.

Currently updating my quarterly spreadsheet of poetry journals and their submissions windows, to be sent out later in the week. If you're a poet looking to submit work, and are not already on my list, sign up here - tinyurl.com/robinsubslist

#reading this week 🙏🏻📚

starry seedheads of Alexanders / Wild celery / Black lovage / Megweed / Hell root / Horse parsley 💚

hello blue sky - here’s a mackerel sky with silver birch #tunstallforest