The Working Class Poet

This piece first appeared on Wales Arts Review in May 2018 as part of their series on working class voices in the arts in Wales.   Sophie McKeand’s two-year-tenure as Young People’s Laureate for Wales comes to an end shortly. Here in the latest instalment of the Wales Arts Review series looking at working class voices […]

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I Am Taliesin

I’m going to post some pieces written for other publications here over the next few weeks, so that they’re all in one place. I’m going to start with I Am Taliesin, which first appeared on the Dark Mountain blog as part of their ‘The Mythos We Live By’ series.  This week we continue ‘The Mythos We […]

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Together, We Are Giants

I was recently commissioned by the Aneurin Bevan University Hospital to write a poem to celebrate 70 years of our wonderful National Health Service. I’m deeply honoured to be involved with such a project as all of my family have relied on the NHS over the years – some of us wouldn’t be here without […]

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Poetry and the National Trust

Over the last week I’ve been fortunate enough to work with local young people at two National Trust properties: Tredegar House in Newport and Chirk Castle, on the north Wales border. Organised and facilitated by Literature Wales as part of the Young People’s Laureateship, each residency lasted two days and a lot of fun was […]

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On Growing & Writing

I was born to the sound of starlings murmurating across the north Wales coastline. The Rebel Sun rode low in an early February sky as the Irish Sea gnawed across my ribcage. My hair was knotted seaweed. Water swelled sand dunes into my belly & a flock of seagulls took up residence in my mouth. […]

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Social Care

I’ve been working with a mix of social care students and people in the community this week at Glyndwr University. We’ve had a great time exploring creativity through poetry and I’ve been delighted with the results. This project is very much the brainchild of Liz Lefroy, a well-respected poet and lecturer who works hard to […]

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Codi Pac

Rôn i’n ar y teledu dros y penwythnos yma (S4C). Mae rhaglen enw Codi Pac – am bobl sy’n dysgu Cymraeg. Roedd ‘na darn am Wrecsam – felly dyma fi yn Saith Seren sgwrs am pethau. Rôn i’n nerfus iawn ond roedd y bobl yn rili lyfli. Dwi wedi bod yn ddysgu Cymraeg ers 8 […]

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Project Hush

Recently I’ve been working on Project Hush, a new site specific theatre piece by Papertrail Theatre Company. Sited at the Rhydymwyn Valley Works (an old WWII chemical weapons factory), it tells the story of the war through the eyes of a (fictional) young woman who worked at the factory. This is the Research & Development […]

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The Welsh Agenda

This week I was honoured to feature in The Institute for Welsh Affairs, The Next 30 / Wales’ Rising Stars: 30 people working to make Wales better over the next 30 years. I had no idea I had been nominated so it was a complete shock to discover the inclusion recently. Reading through the list, […]

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Community Artistry

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it is to be a community poet. Stitching it into poems, I’ve tried to understand the compulsion to go and work with community groups – to face the judgements of strangers and still feel the need to share poetry and the spoken word.  I often feel apprehensive […]

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