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Rrrrrrrip! Yikes! That’s the sound of the Planet Poetry rulebook being wantonly torn in half for our Season 4 finale. For one episode only Robin and Peter abandon their solemn vow and share some of their own poetry from forthcoming Pindrop and Mariscat publications.

Then, under the chalky Sussex cliffs, we bask in recollections of another glorious season peppered with wonderful conversations with superb and entertaining guests.

We want to thank you dear listener for lending us your ears. Have a glorious summer! We’ll be back with a spanking new season in October.

Oi! That blinking gull’s got its beak in my chips!

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Grip the square steering wheel of your Austin Allegro and let Jane Commane navigate you through the haunted places of the post-industrial Midlands. She treats us to poems from Assembly Lines published by Bloodaxe including UnWeather, quite possibly the best Brexit response we've heard.

We upload this episode on the day of the UK's General Election... So as well as sprinting to the polling stations, we take a moment to delve into the idea of political poetry. Peter reads I Woke Up by Jameson Fitzpatrick a fine example of how the personal is political, and Robin revisits Adrien Mitchell's poem To Whom It May Concern (Tell Me Lies About Vietnam). But thanks to Danusha Laméris's poem Small Kindnesses from her collection Bonfire Opera our faith in humanity is rapidly restored.

Photo of Jane Commane by Lee Townsend

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Hear Rory Waterman describe his experience of being stuck in quarantine in Korea, where (as well as doing press ups) he used his time to begin his fourth collection Come Here to This Gate, from Carcanet Poetry. He tells us about Korea's DMZ, hilarious Lincolnshire folk tales, and we explore an exceptionally moving sequence about the death of his troubled father.

Also... Peter belatedly discovers the translation by Martyn Crucefix of Raine Maria Rilke's Duino Elegies. Spoiler: it is fantastic. And Robin remembers the hugely creative Ann Perrin who sadly passed last month (May 2024). Robin also uncovers these essential statistics: which insects are most mentioned in Haiku? Admit it. It's kept you awake at night, hasn't it?

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Silent faces and displaced lives. Seni Seneviratne gives voice to overshadowed Black children, exotic pages and servants in the portraits of nobility and the mercantile class in 18th Century paintings. Other of her poised and beautiful poems, from The Go-Away Bird from Peepal Tree Press, are infused with bird imagery, and the migrations of travellers going deeper into themselves.

Meanwhile Robin jumps into the world of online poetry magazines, looking at the long-running Ink Sweat & Tears, and one of the newer mags Propel Magazine. And Peter is intrigued by Victoria Kennefick's latest collection Egg/Shell from Carcanet - a passionate book in two halves, exploring early motherhood and miscarriage, and the impact of a spouse's gender transition and the dissolution of a marriage.

Photo of Seni Seneviratne by Sam Hardwick at Ledbury Poetry

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Staring at the mark on the wall where that painting once hung? Wondering why the moon, seen by others, has been hidden from you? You've entered the world of Absence (Cheerio Poetry 2024) by Ali Lewis. He guides us through this exceptional first collection, from the painful ache of lost love, to the possibilities unleashed by running over a pheasant.

Robin talks about poetry & walking, via Robert Frost's poem Acquainted with the Night. We also venture into the dark and terrifying beauty of Paul Celan, and read Celan's poem Todesfuge, Death Fugue. And we happen across Poetry Peter, Peter Smith, a fisherman and proto-performace poet in Anstruther and Cellardyke - and Peter Kenny reads one of his poems... excruciatingly badly.

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Hop aboard. No time to idle in green pastures here, instead let’s follow Roy Mc Farlane as he guides us through his collection Living by Troubled Waters from Nine Arches Press weaving the toxic legacy of slavery in the complexity and warmheartedness of his own personal history.

Plus we glance at a gorgeous poem, Leaves, from Ursula K. Le Guin, mull over the latest winner of the UK’s National Poetry Competition, The Time I Was Mugged in New York City, by Imogen Wade, and stroke our chins over idea of magazines long-listing their contributors.

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We’re back with global ambitions for World Poetry Day. First we skip over to Dublin to interview Seán Hewitt about his gorgeous second collection Rapture’s Road, published 2024 by Cape. Enriched by the traditions of Irish poetry, Seán’s work speaks unflinchingly to contemporary issues as well as conjuring moments of absolute beauty from language.

Robin and Peter learn more about International Poetry Day, and Robin discovers a fabulous poem by Netherlands poet Marjolijn van Heemstra. Meanwhile Peter has immersed himself in the pages of Living in Language, International reflections for the practising poet, edited by Erica Hesketh, and finds himself wowed by South Korea’s Lee Hyemi, and Somali-born Asha Lul Mohamud Yusuf.

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A classic interview from the archive: Inua Ellams talking about his extraordinary book The Actual (Penned in the Margins, 2020), a powerful, personal and often very funny collection that pokes a sharp stick at the legacy of British Empire, foolish machismo, hero culture, relationships and much more.

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Planet Poetry is a labour of love, paid for out of our own pockets.
If you enjoy the podcast, please show your support and Buy us a Coffee!