iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

FOR SALE: 6 things I wrote in my notes app without any further context and now can’t remember why. You could use them as poem titles or just look at them every so often and quietly think. Entirely up to you. Fifty quid for the lot O.N.O

Haunted dream number 1
False Autumn
Leap second
Neon lights on a tower of dust viewed from below at midnight
400,000 Kit Kats stolen en route to Poland
This is not important

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

I had “Many thanks to my colleagues for the staff award nominations, but the true awards are the friends we make along the way” typed up as a LinkedIn post for a while there and it took everything I had to not hit send.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 12/01/2026

This is issue 103 of The Rialto and I have a poem in it, which is exciting. Also a Minecraft Zombie Hamburglar but that’s beside the point.

Issue 103 of the Rialto and a Zombie Minecraft Hamburglar.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 04/09/2025

Cleanse your timeline with a cat pic. The black and white kitten is Oreo. The Turkish van mid yawn is Elsa. Pause for a moment. You don’t need to keep scrolling right now. You can put the phone down. You can just be in the room you’re in for a while.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 31/08/2025

Over the last month my ‘Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else’ #poetry #zines have crossed the ocean from the UK to Portland, Maine and popped up in Wales, Glossop, Manchester and at a Drake concert. To find out what role Lou Ferrigno played in all this click the thing.

open.substack.com

Take This With You... (August update)

L’appel du vide

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 24/08/2025

I reckon about a hundred bots have followed me in the last 24 hours. Anyone else getting this too?

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 24/08/2025

What’s triggered me suddenly getting so many new followers? Have I been put in a new starter pack or something?

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 21/08/2025

Well done Zine 15, the first one of these things to cross a sea. I wonder where you’ll turn up next. Subscribe to my (free) Substack for occasional updates on where these things get to.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 21/08/2025

I’ll get around to posting a full update soon on where my #poetry #zines have been found this month to my Substack page (link in bio) but I’m particularly excited today to wake up to the news that a zine I left on a train to Manchester in early July has just shown up in Portland, Maine.

A map tracking a zine from England to Portland, Maine.

A zine stuck on the sign of the Scottish Poetry Library.

A zine on a train in Manchester, England.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 03/08/2025

Hello Bluesky. Stop the doom scroll for a second and enjoy this photo of my kittens Elsa and Oreo. Have a good day.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 28/07/2025

More from my ongoing poetry zine experiment on the attached link. The zines have made it to London and are starting to gather other people's artwork as they travel.

open.substack.com

Zine Project (Week 6)

The zines have made it to London

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 21/07/2025

Hello Bluesky. Here's another update on my current experiment, where I write poetry zines, leave them in public for other people to pass along, then map the zines' travels.

open.substack.com

Poetry zine experiment - Week 5

Dispatches from the mile radius around my house

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 18/07/2025

Someone had uploaded the full thing on YouTube. 3 likes, no comments. He comes out to applause then there’s a short silence and he says “Hello”. The crowd bursts into uproarious laughter. I wonder what he did with his face.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 18/07/2025

I just perched a #poetry #zine on top of a signed Phil Cool vinyl, as you do. Phil Cool was a comedian from Chorley whose main thing was that he would pull faces. I looked online to see if I could find this album. I was curious how he translated such a visual act to an audio only medium…

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

I’m leaving poetry zines in random places to be found by strangers. They each contain instructions to the finder to take the zine with them and leave it somewhere else. In the linked post I start to map out where the zines have been so far.

open.substack.com

Zine experiment - Week 4

Mapping where the zines have been.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

I put them next to a memoir of the actor Dirk Bogarde, who I then Googled to try to find interesting facts to end this post with. I found out 2 things about the guy. 1) He wrote some really good poems. 2) He couldn’t figure out what to do with one of his legs in photographs

A photo of Dirk Bogarde doing an awkward thing with one of his legs

Another photo of Dirk Bogarde doing an awkward thing with one of this legs

Yet another photo of Dirk Bogarde doing an awkward thing with one of his legs

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

A week or so ago I found a book of poetry called The Rubaiyat on the charity stand at Tesco. I’ve now replaced The Rubaiyat with my own Rubaiyat, except Rubaiyat means quatrain and none of the poems in my zine are quatrains, but still. I put some more poems where there used to be poems

A poetry zine left on a charity book stand

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 10/07/2025

My #poetry #zines are on the move! I’ll figure out a way to map their movements then post more here and on the Substack in my bio. Thanks to anyone who’s messaged to tell me where you found one/left one. The pics are the latest zines, left on my morning/evening commutes into/out of sunny Manchester.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 04/07/2025

TAKE THIS WITH YOU & LEAVE IT SOMEWHERE ELSE! Hot off the presses and coming soon to the empty space by the crystal skulls. It’s been hard to get out and about this week so I’ve grabbed the chance to make a shiny new #poetry #zine and leave it next to some ornamental skeletons.

A shiny poetry zine left next to some ornamental skulls

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 30/06/2025

I’ve posted another update about my ongoing #poetry #zine experiment. I put loads more of these things out over the last week and am having a lot of fun writing and making them. Click the thing to find out more and as a bonus you'll receive a reasonably serviceable metaphor about bus seats.

open.substack.com

Zine Project: Week 2

A serviceable metaphor about bus seats

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 27/06/2025

If you’re out browsing for Millennium Falcons today you might stumble across one of my poetry zines. If you do, take it with you and leave it somewhere else. #poetry #zine

A zine next to a millennium falcon model

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 26/06/2025

The patterns are so random on trains & buses because it’s supposed to distract your eye from stains or vandalism, like you’ll be so thrown by the overall chaos of the complicated patterns that you just won’t be able to notice any details. Anyway I’ve thrown another #poetry #zine out into the world

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 25/06/2025

I lodged this zine between the seat and the wall of the train. The photo is rubbish because it was really busy and I was sat across from someone. I was trying to be stealthy but my flash went off. #zine #poetry

A zine stuck between the seat and wall of a train

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 24/06/2025

I’ve scattered many zines around today. I’ve been on a bit of a spree. Frank here appears to have found one already. #zine #poems #zinester #foundpoetry

A Frank Sidebottom statue holding a zine

A close up of the hand of a Frank Sidebottom statue holding a zine

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 24/06/2025

It continues. Left on the bus. I tried to do another crown bind here but the card was too thick so I had to do an 8 page fold instead and it’s made me want to vary the binding/folding up. I saw a great thread bound book the other day that I loved so I might give that a go. #zines #poetry

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 23/06/2025

I've posted an update on my Substack about how my #poetry #zine experiment is going so far, for anyone interested in that sort of thing. open.substack.com/pub/martinsm...

open.substack.com

Zine experiment- Week 1

The story so far

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 21/06/2025

Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else: stuffed in the magazine rack at a cafe near you. #poetry #zine #zinemaking

A zine stuffed into a magazine rack at a cafe

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 20/06/2025

The experiment continues. Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else: stuck to a bus window near you! #poetry #zine

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 20/06/2025

I’m going to quietly drop a load more of my poetry zines in random public places this afternoon. No two have the exact same poems. They only exist in these physical zines. Hopefully somebody who finds one plays along. #poetry #zine

5 homemade poetry zines called “Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else”

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 20/06/2025

I wrote this and didn’t know where to put it, so it can live on my Substack. Its about Brian Wilson, ish, sort of. open.substack.com/pub/martinsm...

open.substack.com

Brian Wilson died

I was working in HMV in Bolton when I first noticed the fascists.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

The experiment continues. Another of these zines is now out in the wild. #poetry #zine

A zine called TAKE THIS WITH YOU AND LEAVE IT SOMEWHERE ELSE, left on a table at a Starbucks.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

I’m scattering poetry zines around with instructions to whoever finds them to take them away, leave them somewhere else and tag me telling me where they left them. Today I snuck the first zine out into the wild. I felt a bit like a spy with the lowest stakes mission possible. #poetry #espionage

A poetry zine called Take this with you and leave it somewhere else, on a bookshop shelf next to Dante’s Inferno.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

I’m hoping a few people who find these things play along and that the zines get to travel a bit before landing in a recycling bin. If that happens, you'll be able to follow the zines' travels on my substack: martinsmith.substack.com/p/take-this-...

martinsmith.substack.com

Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else

An experiment

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

Nobody will ever read any of the contents of these zines unless you happen to find one of them. I want to briefly interrupt a random stranger’s day with some weird little poems.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

And so, here we are. ‘Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else’ is an experiment I’ve started today. I’m making zines and I’m leaving them in public places for people to find.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

I bet the poetry journals would love the one about Katy Perry going to space, right? And what about these fiddly ones about grief? Do I even want those to be out in the world or are they just me trying to figure something out?

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

Maybe some sort of celebratory social media post about how I’m a capital P Poet now then accompany that with the stupid sonnet I wrote about my local pound shop? Or sneak the one I wrote about my favourite bus route out somewhere under a pseudonym?

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

Lately I’ve found myself writing a lot of poems. I didn’t set out to and I have other things I should probably be doing but anytime I sit down to write, what usually comes out is a poem. I’ve been thinking about how (or if) I should start to free them from my notebook.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

Before that, all the poems I’d ever loved had landed in front of me when I was doing something else. Maybe on my feed while commuting, or quoted in a song lyric or a film’s dialogue. They’d land on me from somewhere and briefly change the course of my day or my train of thought.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

A new thing. I like the idea of a poem interrupting someone’s day. I’ve only recently, in the last few years, been actively and deliberately reading poetry. I was made to teach it one year, against my loud objections, and I fell into a rabbit hole I’ve never been able to get out from #poetry

A homemade zine titled Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else.

The inside cover of a zine with instructions to take the zine with you, leave it somewhere else and tag the author on social media.

2 homemade zines titled Take This With You & Leave It Somewhere Else.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 04/03/2025

If you write the word “Imagine” during a Facebook messenger chat it displays a pop-up asking if you’d like Meta AI to imagine something for you. That feels like a particularly dystopian UI choice.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Every year on this day I find this little present to myself from 12 years ago in my diary and am grateful that I wrote it down. I like to think that Ric Flair had the exact same dream that night.

A diary entry from 12 years ago reading: “Last night I had a dream that I was mates with Ric Flair.
I was walking down the street and I saw him there, across the street, grinning away. I waved and he greeted me warmly. He was 1970s Ric Flair and not the aged Ric Flair of today.
He treated me like an old friend and I felt validated by his approval. We walked along and he strutted and generally had a good time and acted like you would expect Ric Flair to act. We both kept shouting "woo" and I shouted
"WHAT'S CAUSING ALL THIS?" his old 70s catchphrase. I expected this knowledge would impress him but he didn't seem to know what I was talking about.”

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 10/02/2025

Weirdly sad about this. Staying in the town you grew up in means watching the places tied to your memories gradually disappear around you. This branch of Smiths was always the meeting spot in my teens. It was where the trip to Manchester/Afflecks or wherever began. Everything must go!

A branch of WH Smith’s with closing down signs in the windows.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 30/01/2025

As David Lynch used to say on his YouTube channel, today I’m getting on the fun work train. First teaching of the year and it’s a day on Media Platforms and storyworlds. What’s everyone else working on today? #edusky #AcademicSky

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 18/01/2025

Slightly drunk, thinking about the career of the actor Tim Robbins. In 1994 he starred in The Hudsucker Proxy and The Shawshank Redemption. Imagine the heights his career could have reached if he stuck to making films named ‘The Surname Thing’ for a few more years. Unfathomable heights.

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Martin Smith @mrtnsmth.bsky.social · 18/01/2025

Blue skies and golden sunshine all along the way.

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