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.

Ken Evans

      There are No Words on a Dead Planet Be yourself. Be one of many. Shout with the only weapon you have. Be nicely raging. Be credible. Be insistent. Be alive. Be floppy in their...

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Edward Lee

      Un Chien Andalou My Father as a dog lies on the road Sunning as clouds roll overhead And the breeze dons the scent of the olive bushes. He raises his foot to scratch his ear And...

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Kitty Coles

      Below Zero The night is freezing, freezing and thick as velvet, and the little stars stand out as thin as pins. The bath is hot and I lower myself, I sink, beneath the water: it...

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Christopher Prewitt

      Cowboy Church After I came out of the coma, it was explained to me that I had (repeatedly) tied cherry stems with my tongue. Reporters in attendance of my waking took pictures,...

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Nicholas McGaughey

      Cold Kitchen Willow has bred in the cold of our kitchen like some internal coppice; where hot cakes and rolls cooled on racks, we have “Shoppers” and wreaths and little else...

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Laura Potts

     Swansea Son He is here in my autumn of age the riverlight through windowpanes, the small-hour laughter, the slim-supple night and moonlight eyes on the history page. I remember his...

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Holly Magill

  Tuesdays she is a cat Sadly it never happens Fridays; there would be more chance of fish. Even in this she is fated to be left wanting. No loved one to present mouse heads to, she crunches...

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Poetry Picks

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

Maxine Rose Munro

      He grows  I gave birth to Restless, and oh how he prowls this house, testing, testing the strength of my walls. Pushing at limits to find weaknesses he stores for future use, careful with his words. He knows soon will come his time, not mine. I...

Dipo Baruwa-Etti

      Seats Before a table of white People, I stand with ballet Slippers strapped/soft soles Head pointed towards the angels. A dance, I commence. Pirouette Grand adage, en point Followed by flight as a helium Addicted balloon. Circling a table of white...

Golnoosh Nour

      Blood Days Break all our delicate cups, my love Shatter their bleeding flowers like you shattered us. I don’t mind; because I was that bad kid, the best student at the back of the class sleeplessly studying stoplessly for all the exams, writing...

Colin Crewdson

      The Road to Kars Mevlana, or Rumi, Sufi poet and mystic, 1207-1273 spent much of his life in Turkey, where his tomb is still revered. Mevlana’s poems are also set to music. We’ve tried every trick. Gathered around the guts, black tubing,...

Sally Michaelson

        Night Raider Creeping down at night to pillage the larder I am my own ghost on the stairs searching  for Digestive biscuits, pungent oranges, hard cheese so I can sink in my teeth, leave a trail of crumbs, a waft of citrus. Mum will find...

Haibun, Tanka, Haiku, & Haiga

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

Jeff Streeby

      Late Hunt On a day this cold, you don’t even need the shotgun. They’re easy to spot, too, those beautiful birds dying in the tumbled stubble of harvest. Find their long tail feathers riffling prairie wind and you can take them alive out of little...

Raamesh Gowri Raghavan

    Still Life I can see them, tweeting furiously as the slogans rise and fall, in ghazal-like cadences. It's chaotic, the only discipline being the hashtag. The police are far better organised of course — in rows behind their bamboo shields, their birchwood...

Stav Poleg

      Circles Haikus inspired by the macarons of Patisserie Madeleine, Edinburgh   ….. Here’s Fleur d’Oranger, Saffron Pistache, Sakura. Instead of breakfast. ….. Fleur d’Oranger The orchard’s wingspan. A child is hula hooping in the evening sun....

Violette Rose-Jones

      No Neighbours that We Know of Around Here my husband smiles in his sleep I could spend the rest of my life here then he rolls over, settling back to slow, calm breathing. this house is echoing-empty. wind rips  up the valley, up this hill, beneath...

Caroline Skanne

   Haiku     shadow boxing will I come out a better person   *   crimson leaved … the Japanese maple becomes my sunset   * new moon knows the secret of letting go       Caroline Skanne is a poet, originally from Sweden,...

John Hawkhead

      Haiku gravel in my knees from the pilgrimage to you your gentle tweezers * gradual rain pattering the willow leaves her hand slips from mine * purple night clouds buffeting under moonlight her lingering scent * under winter clouds the old rook...

12 Days of Christmas

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

Words & Images

Words with images previously published on the website.

Chris Guidon

                                          Chris Guidon is a confessional artist and poet from Kidderminster. Like a snake he needs sunshine to...

Paul Sands

        Paul Sands was born in 1962 and spent his formative years close to the River Trent in Nottingham. He began writing in 2010 . He self-published his first collection of poetry,” ego…ergo” in June 2012 and is currently talking himself out of...

Veronica Von Pegg

          Veronica Von Pegg is a mixed media artist, a photographer and writer, who expresses a past life through images and words. She collects second hand items, and is a firm believer in reincarnation

Word & Image from C. Albert

  Flora the Poet    In Roundling time when days were young and she grew younger – Flora   who dressed in blossoms of the seasons: poinsettia, pansy, honeydew and rose, whose dewy topiary hair was adorned with watermelon-colored dumplings and her face painted...

Rob Stuart

  Rob Stuart is a college lecturer, screenwriter and poet from London. His credits include Lighten Up Online, Magma and Snakeskin.

Blogs and news

Blogs and archived news from 2007 to 2020.

Reviews

Archived reviews from 2007 to 2020.

Interviews

Archived interviews from 2007 to 2020.