iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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Dawn McLachlan @deemclachlan.bsky.social · 18h

A poem for the @thebrokenspine.co.uk #poetryprompt #bites My slant on it after the wind blew in from the sea. #poetrycommunity #poets #poems #poetsofbluesky #poemsabout

Westerly
By Dawn Mclachlan
On that day
an insistent breeze
came from the west
and gathered in its bite
the siren's song
of far dark oceans
It sung of moon guided ships
and the endless horizon
In the teeth of the moment
I felt it
the hard urge to follow
the tugging of the tide
a kiss of salt upon my lips
as a run away wind
called my name

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Sue Finch (she/her) @suefinch.bsky.social · 19h

'I've Nothing to Offer the White Horse in the Dream' for #PoemsAbout #Bites @thebrokenspine.co.uk

I’VE NOTHING TO OFFER THE WHITE HORSE I DREAM OF
Head down shy
a white horse senses me,
whinnies – as if a desire to gallop
is rising inside.

She comes right up to the fence.

Spider-leg eyelashes frame her eyes,
defined jawbone
makes her almost too thin.

I want to touch
the coarse hair of her mane
to know if her blood warms it.

I am wishing now for an apple
or a carrot.

As if reading my mind her mouth opens,
those pupils flash wild.

I have nothing to offer.

A cloud of hayed breath
puffs between us.
Before I can release myself from her gaze,
she clamps my arm.

When I was young
I used to bite my forearms
to feel the resistance of flesh
imprint my incisors.

I bit my brother once.

Now there is a horse,
with blunted yellowed teeth,
latched on hard, biting my skin to burst it

to taste the metal of my blood.

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A. A. Rubin @thesurrealari.bsky.social · 12h

The October Country, by Ray Bradbury #bookwormsat

Black text on white:

OCTOBER COUNTRY
... that country where it is always turning late in the year. That country where the hills are fog and the rivers are mist; where noons go quickly, dusks and twilights linger, and midnights stay. That country composed in the main of cellars, sub-cellars, coal-bins, closets, attics, and pantries faced away from the sun.
That country whose people are autumn people, thinking only autumn thoughts. Whose people passing at night on the empty walks sound like rain....

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 18h

If you’re anywhere near Dorchester today or tomorrow there’s a brilliant free festival called The Script’s The Thing spread over 5 venues up and down the high street. 100 15 minute performances from a range of writers. Come see!

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

I wrote a poem for my friend. She was a gardener and a journalist. I can’t believe she’s gone.

Tilia Cordata in Autumn

For Ruth

You taught me the name for the pale green
papery wings that guard the fruit of the lime
tree outside the church. Bracts.

Today the breeze moves through the leaves
of that tree; it is October and at last moving
towards being cold.

The leaves are turning: yellow. Gold. The bracts
on the tree are ready to go. The wind will take them.
And this morning I received the news that you had
gone on ahead and they will fall without you.

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TheDevilsTuna @thedevilstuna.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

#vss365 Original the parrot learned the word from a tv in 1994. sin, it says. sin, sin, sin. it doesn't know God. it doesn't know the apple or the snake. it says it to the seed dish, to the mirror, to the cuttlefish. it says it until it's just a whistle with a sharp edge. #sin #poetrycommunity

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

US government = barbarians. It’s like Rome under Caligula or Nero

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Jenevieve Carlyn @coastalpoet.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Rustic tales of the Leatherman, the Hartford Circus Fire of 1944, Baseball, Marilyn Monroe, and more for this week's blog... A tribute to my home state reflecting on the recent publication of The Nutmeg Anthology of Connecticut Poems, with a launch event this Thursday at Guilford Free Library 🍂

jenevievecarlyn.com

Poetry from the Nutmeg State

Greetings from… “the Nutmeg State?”Like you, reader, I wasn’t sure how Connecticut had acquired this sobriquet. Apparently, it comes from an old legend about Yankee peddlers…

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Phil M 🦻🏼💚 🍉 🏳️‍⚧️ 🇵🇸 @phillm.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

When they talk about reducing red tape, remember this image.

Grenfell Tower, a black smouldering carcass of the building shorty after the fire, in 2017.

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Matthew Stewart @roguestrands.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

Had a look at the poetry section of Waterstones in Chichester the other day. Deeply depressing. Insta poets, dead poets, sale-or-return, box-ticking collections from funded publishers, and themed anthologies. And no representation whatsoever of the ace poetry that's being written in the U.K...

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

Our Noble Selves by Kate Atkinson

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Tom Gauld @tomgauld.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

My latest books cartoon for @theguardian.com

Title: Just announced! Three new Gruffalo books commissioned from bestselling authors!

Lee Chilld:
The Gruffalo just wants a quiet life, but when a crime syndicate moves into the deep dark wood, he must use his terrible claws and the terrible teeth in his terrible jaws to protect the fellow.

Sally Rooney:
The Gruffalo moves to contemporary Dublin. He
ill ever see past his orange eyes, purple prickles and poisonous wart.

Kazuo Ishiguro:
After a long absence, the gruffalo returns to the forest and attempts to make sense of his past. Encounters with a mouse, a fox, an owl and a snake uncover long-buried memories, regrets and revelations.

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Gary Legg @poetryman1.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Love her brilliance!☀️☀️ 'Flood' by Gillian Clarke @tomsnarsky.bsky.social #smallpoemsunday

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Thank you, Jude. I am in absolute shock

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Longbarrow Press @longbarrowpress.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Our books are well-constructed, good and useful things, and if you buy one, it will enable us to make more. Recent titles include Matthew Clegg's 'Have You Always Been Here?', Fay Musselwhite's 'The Gleaning', and Steve Ely's 'Eely'. You can order them here: longbarrowpress.com/current-publ...

Ten Longbarrow hardbacks, spines facing out.

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Gail Aldwin @gailaldwin.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Happening tomorrow (Sunday 4 October). Everyone welcome.

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Marie 🇨🇦 @pawbaby2.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

This separatist garbage actually showed up in our mailbox TODAY. I’m furious. Alberta is not theirs to rip away from Canada. 🇨🇦 To the separatists trying to divide our country: you’re going to hear from the rest of us. #ElbowsUp #CanadaStrong #USDemocracy

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

This was a sudden illness I think

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I am struggling to believe it. They were on holiday.

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

My beautiful friend -10 years younger than me - has died suddenly. I am devastated. Celebrate all your relationships - the family of your heart and the family of your blood. 💔

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The Crack Magazine @thecrackmagazine.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Newcastle Poetry Festival 2026 kicks off today! Frid 2nd - Sat 3rd Oct. This fantastic festival brings national & international poets to the North East. There'll be readings, workshops, & conversations about poetry. Full program here; www.newcastlepoetryfestival.org.uk @bloodaxebooks.bsky.social

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The Broken Spine (SUBS OPEN) @thebrokenspine.co.uk · 03/10/2026

The apocalypse doesn't have to arrive with a mushroom cloud. Sometimes it is environmental collapse. Sometimes a society ending. Sometimes one person's world disappearing while everybody else's carries on. LAST LIGHT: APOCALYPSE POETRY. shorturl.at/hFE9K

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Pluto Press @plutopress.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

The Anti-Defamation League: A Critical Reader brings together a collective of scholars, organizers, and activists to expose the ADL as a deeply reactionary and conservative force in American politics. OUT NOW👇️

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David Birch @davidbirch.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Thank you @alanparrywriter.co.uk @thebrokenspine.co.uk for today's #PoemsAbout prompt #Rot. Here are some unfiltered reflections on the state of our local river. Looking forward to reading other offerings from the #PoetryCommunity later

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

You really should read this one

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Peter Stefanovic @peterstefanovic.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Your weekend reminder that Nigel Farage wants to - leave the ECHR - repeal the Equality Act - Strip back workers rights - Lift restrictions on exploitative zero-hours contracts - repeal the Renters’ Rights Act which abolishes no fault evictions He is not on your side youtu.be/KxOQRt8PQys?...

youtu.be

If UK media actually explained Nigel Farage’s policies to the public no one would be supporting him

YouTube video by Peter Stefanovic

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Anyone know Antony Gormley?

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Vikki C. @vikkicwrites.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Delighted to have a new poem "Queerness of Our Species" in @rowanglassworks.bsky.social Issue 33! Also a special "Looking Glass" feature with meta-discursive insights about my poem plus a video reading 🔥 Thank you to EIC Katie Budris for including me in this gorgeous issue! Link below 🤍 #poetry

Queerness of Our Species

Vikki C.

Male penguins raise three young, said the headline.
The two had chased the female off, right after she’d laid eggs.
By dusk, the couple had planned the whole family.

Another cruelty to convention. Another soft survival.

It isn’t for us to know if the mother is still alive,
so the story pickaxes at unknowns,
becoming thinner as days glow and contract.

The moment we chose each other, the soft down
between us began to molt, leaving the bare cage of our hands,
the bony lamps of our shoulder blades.

There’s no word for such quickening anymore.

My own weather froze the feather I witnessed on my
way out to Portobello—but never enough to fix it
to the icy ledge. The same ledge I was known

to lean out from—man-watching with a bear’s hunger.

The tiny plume lifted sharp on a white wind,
sailing off to the place where the tender ring.
Later, I read that the mother penguin was found,

circling her young—but now thinks them all corrupt.

The two males clean out of sight—still famed
for their strange deed. It’s unclear who abandoned whom,
only that things circled, our feet slipping beneath dun grass

—till we raised each other again, out of more-than-human nature.

That Sunday, armed with market flowers and brown paper bags,
I brought back your favourite fish for supper—though
you were unlikely to attend. I hoped we’d dine together again.

Late light flooding the kitchen. Scent of herbs and fatigue,

the fish glittering on the large wooden board.
Its one marble eye turning from clear to cloudy
—a small heaven, keenly looking out for your return.

That Sunday, armed with market flowers and brown paper bags,
I brought back your favourite fish for supper—though
you were unlikely to attend. I hoped we’d dine together again.

Late light flooding the kitchen. Scent of herbs and fatigue,

the fish glittering on the large wooden board.
Its one marble eye turning from clear to cloudy
—a small heaven, keenly looking out for your return.

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Thank you very much! It’s one of the pieces in the mix. I really enjoyed the poetry evening.

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Sent out a sample of my manuscript today. Fingers crossed. 🤞🏻

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I thought Andy Burnham was brilliant yesterday but I am now waiting for the ‘whataboutery’ to start. People, we can’t have it all and we can’t have it all at once.

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JWexTheSpa @jwsidders.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Listen to the applause. This is only going in one direction ...

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💚🌏Myles🌏💚 @rainbowregionmyles.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Good afternoon rebels...

"Nobody knows how this ends. So why the fuck are we surrendering to the worst possible ending? Despair doesn't know the future any better than hope does. Optimism isn't naïve. It's a moral imperative." - David Graeber

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Gillian Martin @gillmartin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

94 year old Jewish human rights barrister, Margaret Owen arrested under the Terrorism Act outside andy burnham's Labour Party conference. UK taxpayers are funding these arrests while masked men terrorise the streets in coastal towns. Lift The Ban on Palestine Action.

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Peter Stefanovic @peterstefanovic.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

'Water is a symbol of what has gone wrong with Britain. A service where the shareholders never lose and the public never win' PM Andy Burnham announces plans for a law change to allow public ownership of water companies 👏

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Beth Brooke @bethbpoet.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Yes, I am one of them. My mum used all of her £70k on care. She lived in a council flat.

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