Mark Fiddes

Join us at the Poetic Heart today ‘Connecting Humanity’ with poets in 10 different languages - from Uzbek and Japanese to Hindi, Arabic and Slovakian, even English.
Scan here. 17.00 GST, 14.00 CET, 08.00 EST.

Poster announcing the sixth anniversary of online poetry journal iamb, and showing the faces of 18 poets who featured in its birthday celebration on Zoom on the evening of January 31st 2026.

Six years ago, a new online poetry journal launched against an inauspicious backdrop of a pandemic and Britain's exit from the EU.

@iamb.uk has since sailed many waves. Its 25th will appear this March. Last night, these 18 poets celebrated the journal's first six years. And it was bloody brilliant!

As the blood runs down his Playboy face

Traffic gridlocks on the BR-116 into São Paulo and a burger box flies out of a passenger window. Two wood pigeons cool in the concrete shade of a brutalist carpark. An Italian waiter in Soho writes his phone number on a bill, flourishing the crossbar on his…

Slow movement sorted, possibly?

Another effortlessly poised and insightful @berlinlit.bsky.social
with cows, paradises, aeronauts and my poem ‘Ontology’.
Set aside a quiet hour this weekend and enjoy.

Written ten years minus one week ago.
(Photo: Masashi Kuwamoto)
#Bowie

Many thanks to Black Bough Poetry and @matthewmcsmith.bsky.social for including this in the excellent new Winter Anthology.

‘Those black pens politicians use to sign bombs will turn into vipers’ 🖊️ 🐍

‘the sky will throng with rainbows and an unruly Druid flashmob’ 🌈

@fiddes.bsky.social in our Christmas - Winter anthology

www.blackboughpoetry.com/news

Cheers Paul and all the best for 2026.
Mark

A cautious welcome to 2026.
‘Year of the Heron’.

As it must have been

Steam rises from drains that reek of knuckle boneboiled overnight with star anise,as it must have beenwhen livestock roamed the streets. Washed sheets drape the wires between tenements.From under a raincoat in a doorway,a junky’s hand tattooed with flowers cups for money.The…

A rainbow in December.
Canal d’Urgell, Catalonia.
More portents, please.

Perfect timing…

Delighted to play the role of The Traveller opening at the showcase event for The Emirates Literature Festival in Jan - also feat. @wasafirimag.bsky.social and a reading with Hesa Aldahel 24.1.26

“He plays no games, and takes no regular exercise. He has no hobbies except for…the entertainment of a large and ordinary black cat to which he ascribes miraculous insight and intelligence.”

Geoffrey Household bio on back of Penguin 1st Ed. ‘Rogue Male’ (1949)

I always used to keep a copy of the Communist Manifesto by the door and asked them if they had heard the Good News about historical materialism.

How lovely!

Security detail for tonight’s gig at The Emirates Literature Foundation.

Stop the clocks.
Lose yourself in 100 years of @newyorker.com poetry over 1000 inspiring pages, thoughtfully woven together by its poetry editor Kevin Young.

A bird in the flame tree

                                          Behind the leaves, the myna bird is mocking us, pretending to be an emergency. “Fire! Fire! Fire!” it screeches from the green darkness which is the best kind, between boughs knuckled like bone or the indentations on the steering…

Always this time of year…
Adam Zagajewski from ‘True Lives’ (2024)

Mark Fiddes: Then & Now This is "Mark Fiddes: Then & Now" by The Poetry Society on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.

vimeo.com/1117830204?f...
Polite Safety Notice
A reading commissioned by @poetrysociety.org.uk for The National Poetry Competition

To celebrate #InternationalLiteracyDay
a poem about book removal.
@unesco.org

Wonderful surprise to receive this Best if the Net nomination from @madridlitmag.bsky.social - all the best to co-nominees.

Tonight it’s fire-dancing with ‘Demoni’ at the Juneda Festa Major in Catalonia.
Bring a hat.

At a time when voices are being stifled, this special issue of @madridlitmag.bsky.social is needed more than ever.

Surprised and delighted that Plaza Poetry Prize judge George Szirtes has awarded first prize to ‘The tank who fell in love with a village’ - congrats to Raymond Solytsek, Wes Lee and Elizabeth Whyatt (2,3 and Highly Commended).

theplazaprizes.com/the-plaza-po...

As voices are being silenced, this new issue of @madridlitmag.bsky.social comes at a crucial time. Thank you for counting me in.

Plugging this wild US anthology on Joy. We need more of it which is why I gave them a poem called ‘Delighted, I’m sure.’
Many thanks to editors Naomi Simone and Chun Hyon Lee.