In this compelling collection, Paul Brookes takes you to the ordinary spaces where lives intersect—shop floors, queues, fleeting conversations—and reveals the deep currents of humanity running beneath them. The poems, rooted in the disquiet of pandemic-era experience, are marked by a patient wisdom and tenderness: an understanding that truth often resides not in grand gestures, but in the smallest exchanges—a damaged loaf, a nervous question, a moment of distance or closeness.
ISBN: 978-1-918132-02-1, 82 pps., £10 inc. p. and p.
'Snollygosters' - shrewd, unprincipled persons like Trump, Starmer and Netanyahu - have dragged politics into the mire of illegal wars and genocide. Norris deploys scatological imagery and technical brilliance in metre and rhyme, illustrated by Martin Gollan's satirical cartoons. They forcefully make the point that the Labour Party is at the point of extinction without a radical return to socialism.
ISBN: 978-1-912710-38-6, 6 colour illustrations, 113 pps, £12 inc. p. and p.
From the Rhondda to the Black Country this exceptionally evocative poetry of two places reminds us of the working conditions our ancestors endured, of the industrial disasters that blighted lives, and the importance of kinship and community. Highly relevant and highly readable.
ISBN: 978-1-918132-04-5, 40pps., £10 inc. p. and p.
These poems confront a loss: the fading dream of a collective bright future that once sustained working-class life. They evoke quiet resilience and solidarity, lingering in the after-hours of a broken and beleagured country that still has the capacity to remake itself.
ISBN: 9781912710997, 68pps., 10 colour images, £12 inc. p. and p. for UK addresses, £12 plus £5 p. and p. for worldwide addresses.
In a series of deeply empathic, figurative vignettes, Price bears distant witness to some of the countless harrowing episodes in the genocide visited on Gaza by Israel's far right regime over the past two years.
ISBN 978-1-912710-98-0, 24pps, £8 inc. p. and p.
This is Mike Jenkins' latest collection of direct and visceral verse from the Valleys, with anguished poems of witness to the ongoing ethnic cleansing by Israel in Gaza; poems exploring history, protest and rebellion in Cymru, Ireland and across the world; and poems from the margins of society, from the broken, the downtrodden and dispossessed voices of modern times.
ISBN: 978-1-912710-88-1, 64 pps, £10 inc. p. and p.
Shouting in the Tunnel is a collection of explicitly political poems, written to bring us together, to express our anger at poverty and injustice, and to inspire us to action. Itis a vivid commentary on today’s world, but throughout it carries a message of hope.
'Airtins' means directions: in these poems, Hershaw re-imagines the moral guidance in Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching, applying a similar outlook to the modern problems of poverty, inequality and wars. Hershaw uses the vivid, demotic cadences of the Scots language to express a vision of a practical, green and spiritual socialism.
This the fourth book in a series of anthologies of radical poetry from contemporary Wales, protesting and grieving austerity at home and wars abroad. The poems point to the need for a sense of the common good, and solidarity and empathy, rather than neoliberal egoism and greed - we not me, us not I.
Young Roundhead Jared Amory relays the story of his childhood friend, Gideon Wade, who early in the English Revolution deserts the Royalist cause, which he had felt...
In this new collection of poems and images, Sam Kemp vividly memorialises the struggles at 'Fortress Wapping' in 1986, when 5000 print and clerical workers went on strike against Murdoch's News International.
Release the Sausages! is an anthology of poems, with absolutely no poems in it. It is a celebration of the first twelve months of Keir Starmer’s government - a monument to the towering contribution to socialist thought of Sir Keir Starmer KCB QC, and his decisive, principled and unifying part in the proud history of the British Labour Movement. And it is a moving tribute to his moral integrity and irresistible charisma, warmth and wit.
Release the Sausages! is £5 inc. p. and p. for a printed copy, with 20 blank pages for you to write your own poems in praise of Sir Keir.
Words United is a new book of poems, anecdotes and observations, a fleet of word-drones sent to expose the brutal genocide, displacement and mass starvation visited upon the Palestinian people by the Israeli government and the Israeli Defence Force, and the lies, hypocrisy and collusion of most British, US and European governments and politicians, and most of the Western media.
Words United by Michael Rosen, ISBN 978-1-912710-81-2, 120pps., £10 inc. p. and p. for UK addresses, £10 plus £5 p. and p. for worldwide addresses. Please allow 1-2 weeks for delivery - it is also available immediately as an ebook.
All profits from books and ebooks sold will be donated to Medical Aid for Palestine.
Waiting for the Light is a collection of short stories exploring the unexpected moral and ethical uncertainties in almost every human endeavour. They follow the tradition of the cautionary tale, covering themes of morality, horror and the limitless ambiguous ingenuity of humankind.
Waiting for the Light, by D. P. Dingham, ISBN 978-1-912710-66-9, £10 inc. p. and p. for UK addresses, £10 plus £5 p. and p. for worldwide addresses.
£10.00Original price was: £10.00.£5.00Current price is: £5.00.
Thirty poems in various forms and styles—rhyme, blank verse, free verse, villanelle, and ‘villanelle-vague’—tackle the seismic events and vicissitudes of recent years: Brexit, Grenfell and the “hostile environment”, the proroguing of Parliament, Boris Johnson’s shambolic premiership, Covid and the lockdowns, “Partygate”, Trump’s insurrection, the resistible rise of Keir Starmer, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Platinum Jubilee, the JUST STOP OIL protests, the death of Elizabeth Windsor and the suppression of republican expression during the mourning period, and the Coronation.
In this collection of poems, Spain's troubled past mixes with the everyday routines, sights, sounds and tastes of Alan McGuire’s adopted homeland. Like any keenly observant Briton living in Spain, poet Alan McGuire can see the legacy of the country's civil war all around him.
In a series of imaginative, insightful poems, many of them beautifully illustrated with woodcut drawings by Ignacia Ruiz, Fran Lock explores the developing love between Mary Magdalene and Jesus, its relationship to Jesus' liberating call for personal and political transformation, and the way it continues to challenge, comfort and inspire us with the ‘love that is stronger than death’.
Love Is Stronger Than Death: Mary Magdalene and the Insurrection of Jesus, by Fran Lock, ISBN 978-1-912710-53-9, £10 inc. p. and p. for UK addresses, £10 plus £5 p. and p. for worldwide addresses.
An Anthology in Solidarity with the People of Palestine, ISBN 978191270782
Since the start of the genocidal war by Israel against the Palestinian people, poems have flooded in to Culture Matters. We have published many of them online, to show our solidarity with the Palestinians and the huge numbers of people in Britain and across the world who have marched in protest against the murderous nature and horrifically disproportionate scale of the Israeli offensive. We have marched to the now familiar chant from which this book gets part of its title.
Now that there is a glimmer of hope that peace, however fragile and precarious, is beginning to break out, we have put together another kind of march of solidarity: an anthology of poems from 70 poets. Some are already on the site, but most of them are new poems. They vary in tone, style and message, but are all great examples of successful political poems – skilful and eloquent expressions of protest, anger, sadness, compassion and a burning desire for justice and peace. As Michael Rosen says:
This is poetry in the face of horror. It's a poetry that investigates how it is we live in a world in which there is a shocking contrast: the normality of living here and the beyond-cruel normality of the mass killing in Gaza. While others have stayed silent, it's a poetry that is not afraid to speak.
The book is available as a pdf, We Are All Palestinians. It is free to download, but you are invited to make a donation of £5 via our Support page. A printed book can also be ordered for £12 inc. p. and p. for UK addresses, or £12 plus £4 p. and p. for EU and worldwide addresses. Please pay via the Support page and email us at books@culturematters.org.uk with your address details.
After production costs have been met, all money received will be given to the Medical Aid for Palestinians charity, to help build an effective, sustainable and locally led healthcare system for Palestinians.
Slave Songs and Symphonies is an ambitious, beautifully crafted collection of poems, images and epigraphs. It's about human history, progressive art and music, campaigns for political freedom, social justice and peace. Above all it's about the class and cultural struggle of workers 'by hand and by brain’ to regain control and ownership of the fruits of their labour.
David Betteridge’s poems are leftist, lyrical, and learned, infused with sadness and compassion for the sufferings of our class, the working class. They are also inspired by visionary hope, and a strong belief that our class-divided society and culture can be transformed by radical politics and good art – and by radical art and good politics.
Bob Starrett’s drawings are much more than illustrations. They dance with the poems, commenting on them as well as illustrating them. Like the poems, they express and resolve the struggles they depict.
Slave Songs and Symphonies tells the story of how slave songs become symphonies – and helps makes it happen. It is not just about class and cultural struggle – it is class and cultural struggle.
I want to change the world, I want to strike the spark or kick the pebble that will start the fire or the avalanche that will change the world a little.
- Fred Voss
Everyone can see the growing inequality, the precarious and low paid nature of employment, the housing crisis in our cities, the divisions and inequalities between social classes, the problems of obesity, drink and drugs, and the sheer everyday struggle to pay the bills for many working people. In this situation, Fred Voss is like a prophet. He is warning us of the consequences of the way we live, he is telling truth to power, and he is inspiring us with a positive vision of a possible – and desirable – socialist future.
- Len McCluskey, General Secretary, Unite the Union
Culture Matters has published a new anthology of poems from the Bread and Roses Poetry Award 2017, sponsored by Unite.
The purpose of the new Award is to encourage poets to focus on themes which are meaningful to workin g class people and communities and to encourage those communities to engage more with poetry. Entrants were given the opportunity to deal broadly with any aspect of working class life and culture and show commitment to the common people, the common good and the common music of poetry.
Mike Quille, the Editor of the anthology, said, “We wanted to encourage Unite members and working people more widely to engage with poetry and the arts generally. And encourage the mainstream poetry world to lift its eyes beyond the narrow poetry ‘bubble’ and be more attentive to the labour movement. The poems in this collection reflect a broad range of themes and moods. They show very clearly the collective strength of writing by working people.”
The Award was kindly supported by Unite, Britain’s biggest trade union. Len McCluskey, General Secretary of Unite, said, “We sponsored the first Bread and Roses Poetry Award because we believe that our members, and working people generally, have an equal right to join in and enjoy all the arts, and other cultural activities. We believe we should be able to afford them, get to them, and enjoy them, and that art should seek to engage with all sections of the community. Working-class people face a continual cultural struggle to defend our cultural commons, to keep cultural activities open to the many, not the few.”
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