The Return of Silver Street Poetry

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Beautiful Poets of Bristol and the Surrounding Metropolises!

We’re thrilled to announce the return of Bristol’s long-established and much missed poetry open mic, following an extended hiatus caused by Covid and then the search for a more spacious venue. 

Silver Street Poetry will now be held on the last Friday of the month, from 12.30 – 2.00pm, at St Stephen’s Church, which is just off Bristol City Centre. We shall be returning in our usual format – two open mic sessions, to which everyone who wishes is invited to read a single poem, separated by two 10-minute sets from a guest poet, in the middle of which there will be a break, where attendees can avail themselves of the facilities, which include a café! The proceedings will be organised and overseen by Deborah Harvey of the Leaping Word, along with Rosalie Alston, Dominic Fisher and Pat Simmons.

Our first gathering will be held on 30th September 2022, when guest poet Deborah Harvey will be reading from her most recent collection of poems, ‘Learning Finity’. Upcoming guests include two more well-known local poets, Dominic Fisher (October) and Helen Sheppard (November).

A contribution of £4 is suggested, or whatever you can afford, to cover room hire costs and the guest poet’s expenses. Our ethos is very much one of support and encouragement, care and mutual respect, and all are welcome.

Entrance to the church is from St Stephen’s Avenue, through the dark blue doors in the porch at the base of the tower. The building is accessible to wheelchair users; please see St Stephen’s website for further details: https://www.saint-stephens.com/your-visit

We’d be grateful if you would spread the word, especially to poets who might not use social media or email and so are less likely to hear that our sessions are resuming.

Many thanks

ANTICIPATING ‘A CUSTOMISED SELECTION OF FIREWORKS’ BY DOMINIC FISHER

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Congratulations to Dominic Fisher, long-time Leaping Word poet, whose second collection, ‘A Customised Selection of Fireworks’ (Shoestring Press) is on the brink of publication.

Dominic will be launching his book at Bristol Folk House on Thursday 16th June at 7.30pm, with guest readings from fellow-IsamBards, Pameli Benham, David Johnson and Deborah Harvey. If you’re in the locality, do come along and help the evening go with a bang.

Anticipating ‘Fontanelle’ by Helen Sheppard

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We’re delighted that another Leaping Word poet, Helen Sheppard, is about to deliver ‘Fontanelle’, her debut collection of poems.

Helen is well-known in the Bristol poetry community and always keen to champion the work of others, which is why the prospect of reading a book of her poems is such a pleasure.

And what a book. You often hear people call poetry collections ‘important’ when they aren’t particularly, whatever other value they might have. However, ‘Fontanelle’, which compares and contrasts Helen’s experiences as a midwife working in the NHS during the 1980s and 90s, with that of her Aunt Doreen, who delivered babies in an earlier, more perilous yet less impersonal era, fully deserves this epithet.

‘Fontanelle’, which is published by Burning Eye Books, will be welcomed into the world this 23rd September, and its launch is taking place at Waterstones in Bristol the following day, Friday 24th September at 7pm.

The Shadow Factory

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The arrival and ritual opening of a box of newly published books is always an exciting moment. And this time we were especially pleased to see that the printers had padded the cargo with paper rather than bubble wrap.

The Shadow Factory is our Deb’s fourth poetry collection from Indigo Dreams Publishing, and its evocative title is straight out of her childhood in 1960s Bristol. ‘As a young girl I was fascinated by the rollsign of the 98 bus that gave its destination as The Shadow Factory,’ she explains, ‘but as the stop we had to get off at came before the terminus, I never got to see it, and an intimation of certain disappointment prevented me from asking what was made there. As a result, The Shadow Factory became a warehouse of wishes and unrealised dreams, a metaphor for life and death, and eventually this collection of poems that explore childhood, memory and the twilight of those household gods we call parents.’

Other poets have had complimentary things to say about our new addition.

Pascale Petit, who awarded the poem Oystercatchers 1st prize in the 2018 Plough Prize Short Poem competition says: ‘Every word is weighted. Although nothing is explicit, something important is being enacted, and the epigraph by Camus adds an anchor, so that we guess his are the words being taken to the sea and released from the heart. I kept coming back to this and getting more from it.’

And in her sensitive review, poetry film maker and novelist Lucy English says ‘The desire to find a place which is ‘not a leisurely stroll from the ice cream van,’ is a strong theme in this collection. [Harvey] comments on the natural world as if this, and not human life is the greater force … Landscape, animals and birds have an intrinsic beauty which she describes with care.’

To read a selection of the poems from The Shadow Factory, please click here.

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The new venue for Silver Street Poetry

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With just ten days to go before the first meeting of Silver Street Poetry in its new home, it feels timely to share our photos of our visit there today and remind our poets of its location.

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We parked in the Galleries – although Trenchard Street car park is nearer, of course – and took the scenic route to get there, via Christmas Steps. (Other, less precipitous approaches – for instance, walking up Colston Street from the Centre – are available.)

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Hours is at 10 Colston Yard, which is reached from Colston Street. What fascinates me about it is that although the entrance is at ground level and therefore fully accessible, it is built into the side of the hill, and the views are amazing. I’d only been there in the dark before, so I was quite excited to get a new perspective on a familiar area.

We checked and it’s fine for poets to bring their own refreshments from nearby cafes, of which there are many.

We returned to Broadmead via Johnny Ball Lane, which passes below Hours and the other buildings of Colson Yard. Here they are, perched atop this magnificent Victorian wall.

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Just time for a quick coffee in Revive Cafe at the top of Corn Street.

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See you on Friday 7th June at our original time of midday and at our new venue of Hours, for hours – well, an hour and a half – of poems shared with friends.