Welcome to the Ink Sweat & Tears Poetry Archive

This archive is formed from all the posts from that original Ink Sweat & Tears website, it now consists of everything we have published up to the end of 2019. IS&T was founded by Salt author Charles Christian in 2007 as a platform for new poetry and short prose, and experimental work in digital media. Charles ran the site single-handedly, publishing new work every day till 2010, when now sole editor, poet and artist Helen Ivory came on board as Deputy Editor. The Ink Sweat & Tears website continues to run and can be found here. 

You can either click on the poems below which run from most recent to oldest, or you can search for particular poem or poet, there is also a list of all the categories to click through. From Prose & Poetry to Words and Images, Haibun, Tanka, Haiku & Haiga, in addition we have all of the Poems of the month and Poetry picks, old blogs and news, award nominated, reviews and interviews.

Please do take a look.

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Prose and poetry

Poems and prose published on the website from start to finish.

Jim Bennett

by | Jun 6, 2018 |

      had a disaster with mu k-uboard por-d coff-- in th- cracks now it sits and dri-s out slowl-u whil- I work out what it lacks it won't do th- l-tt-r b-tw--n  x and z-d in alwaus...

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Helen Pletts

by | Jun 5, 2018 |

      The Monster London Fatberg   Hi, Berg here. Call me Fats. I slug-slither with the rats; creep-crawl, clog up the tunnel. City-cloy the disposables; white, non-perishable,...

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Gregg Dotoli

by | Jun 4, 2018 |

        Always Yours like red paint to the old barn closer to you I am as stars to night and ivy to rock closer to you i am when or where I’m forever there      ...

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Dennis Tomlinson

by | Jun 3, 2018 |

      Today   the clouds are a mountain range across the sky   close to me a plum tree with cloven trunk   tortuous, the last tree to blossom   your white flowers are dancing in...

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Jonathan Humble

by | Jun 2, 2018 |

      On The Road To Samaria In these shoes, I negotiate life in the third person; toes swathed in top quality calfskin, safe from random shit and shards, where neither grass nor...

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DS Maolalai

by | Jun 1, 2018 |

  A photo of Melissa The mouth is wide on the face and the head tilted to one side with a question. Behind her there's nothing but shrubbery. She could be in a field somewhere but I know...

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Sarah Parker

by | May 29, 2018 |

      Claude Cahun Bald as an egg naked and ageless negative. Your eagle’s beak, your Buddhist’s ear the shorn vulnerability of your nape shot by a flash. Marcel Moore behind the lens...

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Poetry Picks

Our favourite poems and ‘best of’ chosen from each month between 2007 and 2019

john sweet

Mar 17, 2016 | ,

      …and the heart a broken bell says she’s tired of being dead and what the hell am i supposed to do? can’t have power without money can’t have god without the devil late august sunlight after four days of rain and i kiss her feet when she asks i...

Robert Harper

Mar 13, 2016 | ,

      Through a Lens They turned and looked at me as I stood half in the doorway, half in the hall, unaware this had been brewing long before the leaves of trust were bagged up in the coal shed. All eyes speaking louder than a bloody lip, screams...

Marion Oxley

Mar 12, 2016 | ,

      A Taxidermist Regenerates Blackburn The heart had gone out of it. They’d wanted a Poundland or a Gregg’s; said they needed it. She got out the rat purse, unzipped the fur, counted the coins. She knew where to spend a pound to buy a frozen takeaway...

Jane Lovell

Mar 10, 2016 | ,

      Two Mountains What is destined will reach you, even if it be beneath two mountains.
What is not destined will not reach you, even if it be between your two lips. Imam Ghazali I have moved two mountains. There is rubble everywhere, pissed off...

Janet Hatherley

Mar 6, 2016 | ,

    Ghazal:  Trace   Nothing’s better than our laughter, on earth, daughter, Mum, me, in stitches, dafter, on earth. Make every second count, the years stride on as time’s a serial grafter, on earth. Night falls quickly, with the fluttering bats and...

Haibun, Tanka, Haiku, & Haiga

Haibun, Tanka, Haiku, & Haiga reviously published on the website.

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12 Days of Christmas

All the poems from our regular 12 days of Christmas feature.

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Words & Images

Words with images previously published on the website.

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Blogs and news

Blogs and archived news from 2007 to 2020.

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Reviews

Archived reviews from 2007 to 2020.

Interviews

Archived interviews from 2007 to 2020.

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