Why I Write Poetry
Ian is the editor of Why I Write Poetry: Essays on Becoming a Poet, Keeping Going and Advice for the Writing Life – fourth in the best-selling series of creative writing handbooks from Nine Arches Press.
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Author Archives: danny
Butcher’s Dog 15
Ian co-edited issue 15 of Butcher’s Dog alongside Jo Clement. Together they whittled down almost 3000 anonymous submissions to choose 23 poems for publication in the magazine, which will be launched in June, 2021.…
Russian translation
Two poems from Zebra have been selected and translated by poet and critic Dmitry Kuzmin for inclusion in Russia’s first anthology of AIDS and HIV related poetry. Featured poets include Thom Gunn, Derek Jarman and Danez Smith.…
touch-me-not
this flower
doesn’t belong
on the canal
hiding
in an airless tunnel
where no-one goes
before dark
rooted
to a thin layer
of dirt
head bowed
butter bloom
an open mouth
that faint smell
of sherbet
when someone
passes
it …
Darklight
My cell had no window, no light bulb. Hallucinations:
tortured faces; a gargoyle on my chest sipping
my lungs through a straw. With a nail from my boot
I scratched help in the dirt ten thousand times – until
it …
2021
| The Rialto (96) | The wood warbler’s song |
| Matter 20 | Scrimshander |
| Sheffield Hallam University | The other lot |
| Guest writer | On spilling a jug of Mai Tai |
| BBC Contains Strong Language | Swifts and the awakening city |
| Commission | |
| Russia’s first international HIV & |
2020
The Rialto (94) Darkwater
The Poetry Society …
2022
| After Sylvia (Sylvia Plath anthology) | |
| – Producer, co-editor and creative lead | Nine Arches Press |
| After Sylvia website | |
| Read Guardian review | |
| Buy book |
2021
| Why I Write Poetry – Editor | Nine Arches Press Buy book |
| Butcher’s Dog Issue 15 – Co-editor (with Jo Clement) |
Zebra longlisted for The Portico Prize
Along with collections by Zaffar Kunial and Michael Symmons Roberts, Zebra was one of three poetry books that made the longlist of The Portico Prize for Literature in 2019. No poetry featured on the shortlist.…
Brontë Writer in Residence
Ian has been appointed Writer in Residence at the Brontë Parsonage Museum for 2023/24.…
Poetry Prize
Ian’s second collection, Tormentil, due from Nine Arches Press in September 2023, has won a Royal Society of Literature ‘Literature Matters’ Award while in progress.…
