the yellow bird
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In 2023, Warren placed first for the Jane Martin Poetry Prize. Warren is author of the pamphlet Fruit Knife Autopsy with Green Bottle Press. To date, Warren has been published in The Frogmore Papers, Magma, Orbis, Poetry Ireland, and Stand.
Our featured publication for May and June is Crossing Paths by Jean Atkin and Richard Skinner, published by Black Cat Poetry Press.
“Written between December 2023 and July 2024, Crossing Paths is a collaboration between poets Jean Atkin and Richard Skinner, both keen walkers, both of whose work is informed by the natural world and the human experience of exploring it. The walks in the collection were taken separately, and in many different locations. They would each pass a poem across, then write a new poem in response.
The poems map landscapes from the Coast to Coast walk across northern England to the Berwyn mountains of Powys; from the ‘rock-hop tussock-clamber’ of Seefin in Cork to ‘the woollen stockings / of Kirkby Stephen’; from ‘paths scrambled to a spirit level’ near Aberfoyle to Cheshire, where you may ‘Wish now on Whistlebitch, for the lost wells, the dew ponds’. Crossing Paths is a book of poems about walking, place, nomenclature and nature.“
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The Providences of Langstrothdale Chase
Jean Atkin
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Space and Seefin
Jean Atkin
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Cloud Inversion Over Aberfoyle
Richard Skinner
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Ingleby Greenhow
Richard Skinner
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Jean Atkin walks with a notebook in her pocket, and is easily tempted away from the signposted path. Her third full poetry collection ‘High Nowhere’ (IDP, 2023) was nominated for the 2024 Laurel Prize and Coast to Coast to Coast published her winning Individual Poet Journal in 2025. She has previously published another eight poetry books, often dealing with place, nature and story. Her poetry has won competitions, been commissioned, anthologised, and featured on BBC Radio 4. Since 2010 Jean has worked as a poet in education and community, often in collaboration with other artists.
Richard Skinner is a walker and a writer, often at the same time. He has climbed the Wainwrights in the Lakes, the Cuillins on the Isle of Skye and Mont Blanc. In 2016, he switched to long distance walking and, since then, he has completed more than 20 long distance walks in the UK, including the West Highland Way, the Pennine Way and the Coast to Coast. Richard has published six books of poems. He is Director of the Fiction Programme at Faber Academy and runs poetry courses for the Arvon Foundation and Sarum College.
Copies of Crossing Paths are available to purchase from the Black Cat Poetry Press website, here. Signed copies may be purchased directly from Jean or Richard.
The last time we made elderflower cordial
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Gabrielle is originally from Suffolk, now based in Nottingham. She has been published by Nottingham Poetry Exchange, Beir Bua Press, Streetcake Magazine and more. Earlier this year, she was a poet-in-residence with Suffolk Libraries and the National Centre for Writing. Instagram: gabstract__ (two underscores)
Seascape, Crosby, Lost
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Maria, from Liverpool, creates the hand-stitched poetry journal, Coast to Coast to Coast, and is writer in residence for Mersey Care NHS Trust, Maria has published six pamphlets – the latest, Subcutaneous, was winner of Lancaster LitFest, March 2025
Luck and the Rec
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Jean Atkin’s third full poetry collection ‘High Nowhere’ (IDP, 2023) was nominated for the 2024 Laurel Prize and Coast to Coast to Coast published her winning Individual Poet Journal in 2025. Her poetry has won competitions, been commissioned, anthologised, and featured on BBC Radio 4. Since 2010 Jean has worked as a poet in education and community.
Sunday
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Jeff’s poems are widely published, most recently in The Aftershock Review, The Alchemy Spoon, Black Nore Review. His pamphlet, Us, was shortlisted for the Live Canon prize. In July 2023 he was diagnosed with a neuro-degenerative condition.
Rules of nomenclature
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Alexandra Citron was born in the US but has lived in the UK since her teens. Her poems have appeared in various places including Propel, iamb, And Other Poems, Ink Sweat & Tears and an Emma Press anthology. @alexcitronella.bsky.social – Bluesky @citronalexandra – Instagram
Two Spoons of Tepid Water
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Peter J Donnelly was born in Middlesbrough and grew up in North Yorkshire. He was educated in York before taking a degree in English Literature at the University of Wales Lampeter, followed by a MA in Creative Writing. His poetry has appeared in various magazines and anthologies including The Starbeck Orion, The Broken Spine, Dreich, High Wolds Poetry Festival, Obsessed with Pipework, Ripon Poetry Festival, Lothlorien, York Literary Review, Dust, Black Nore Review, High Window, Hornblower Press, Tap into Poetry and The Fig Tree.. He was a joint runner up in the Buzzwords open poetry competition in 2020 and won second prize in the Ripon Poetry Festival competition in 2021. He is the author of three books, The Second of August, Solving the Puzzle and Bloom and Grow, all published by Alien Buddha Press. Peter J Donnelly lives in York.
Morning After
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Nora Nadjarian is a poet and fiction writer from Cyprus. Her work was published in The Interpreter’s House, Magma, Perverse, Under the Radar and elsewhere. Her poetry collection Iktsuarpok is available from Broken Sleep Books.
atriumpoetry.com 