Blog
Seven Makar-ish Things
19 February 2022
A Makarship must give you time to write, it should suggest how to turn that into a performance or a publication, and, ideally, fund it. Such a set-up understands that the writer, their community, heritage, and artistic peers are all equals.Meet the Roddy Lumsden Memorial mentees
1 April 2022
Roddy Lumsden (1966-2020) was a widely acclaimed and innovative poet – and left his mark on a generation of upcoming UK poets, including Sarah Howe, Kayo Chingonyi and Ahren Warner. Roddy was a poet of rare quality who offered...
Call for submissions: Leith links…
1 March 2022
A new tail grows…celebrating the spirit and talent of Leith, The Darting Salamander-the first LeithWritings anthology- was published, delivered, launched and welcomed in true Leith style on the 2nd of November 2021. The book featured new voices alongside more...Collective poem created for Stirling City of Culture bid
2 February 2022
Stirling Makar Laura Fyfe has written a blog about putting poetry and literature into the heart of Stirling's bid for City of Culture 2025.Address to an Algorithm
25 January 2022
The Scottish Poetry Library was invited to collaborate on a project for the UK Pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai. Led by artist and designer Es Devlin OBE, the object was to build and train an Artificial Intelligence algorithm to...Fur maist o history, anonymous wis a wumman
24 January 2022
Commentary on the ither anonymous poems is drookit in siblike dingiein or dingin doon o the obvious, whaurivver a wumman’s wirds are fund.Scottish Poems on the Underground
21 January 2022
Our friends at Poems on the Underground got in touch to tell us about lots of Scottish poets featured in their January posters. Poets including Robert Burns, Don Paterson and Kathleen Jamie are included. You can read the poems-and...“Our World, Our Future”
20 January 2022
I feel one of the key roles of being the city poet is to facilitate this flourishing and in the case of the future of the planet for us all at the beginning of a new year to go...Roddy Lumsden Memorial Mentorship
17 January 2022
Roddy Lumsden (1966-2020) was a widely acclaimed and innovative poet – and left his mark on a generation of upcoming UK poets, including Sarah Howe, Kayo Chingonyi and Ahren Warner. Roddy was a poet of rare quality who offered...Ceathramh
12 January 2022
Am bliadhna, tha sinn a' cur air bhog litir-naidheachd na Gàidhlig, a bheir a-steach gach rud co-cheangailte ri bàrdachd na Gàidhlig ann an Alba.
I Remember…
22 December 2021
The Herald is fundraising for a national memorial to remember those who lost their lives to Covid, and to support those who are grieving loved ones or still living with the effects of long Covid. A site in Glasgow’s...Interesting Times: A blog by Alan Spence, December 2021
22 December 2021
t was an opportunity to push myself. From writing mainly short pieces - haiku and tanka, the odd sonnet - I stretched to longer, narrative pieces, gravitating towards traditional forms.