how the poets have named a heaven

Physician, Heal Thyself

This week we asked our Poetry Pharmacists a simple question: what poem have you prescribed to yourself recently? Here are some of the poems that have been keeping us company this week.

Chloe
Poem II by Mary Jean Chan, from Bright Fear
"I returned to this poem after reaching a significant milestone. It reminds me that poetry can offer a sense of direction when life feels directionless, and that not knowing where to go next may simply mean you are exactly where you need to be."

Carris
Talking to My Mother About Clothes by Sarah Stewart, from Devour Everything
"I've been feeling a little homesick recently and happened to be wearing my mother's jumper to work when I reread this poem. I love poetry that honours the significance of clothing and fabric, particularly in relation to culture, femininity, class and family connections."

Patrizia
60% of bisexual people are in psychological distress at any one time by Elspeth Wilson, from He, She, They, Us: Queer Poems, edited by Charlie Castelletti
"I picked up this anthology after repeatedly noticing it on the shelf and finally giving myself permission to buy a copy. It's a wonderful collection of queer voices, bringing together poets including Audre Lorde, Jackie Kay, Langston Hughes and many others.
With beautiful lines such as 'an electric gap between you and the lace', it brought back memories of my first queer love with both tenderness and strength. During Pride Month especially, this anthology feels like the perfect prescription, celebrating visibility, joy, identity and belonging."

Pat
I’d like to prescribe myself Three Little Pigs by Kim Moore, from The House of Broken Things, because it makes the reader think about what we tell young people about the world they’re growing up in. The poem debates whether or not to be totally honest with them about the bad people they will surely encounter, or if it’s best to allow them their innocence a while longer, and let them believe in forgiveness and second chances even for life’s Big Bad Wolves.

Deb 
Evening Poem  by Seán Hewitt from Tongues of Fire
I chose this poem because I am lucky enough to have an old greenhouse, and felt unexpectedly sad at seeing it begin to fall apart. It reminded me of the kind of care that gets handed down through families, and how sometimes we have to learn to give a little of that care to ourselves.

Katie
Popcorn by John McCullough from Crowd Voltage
"I recently shared this poem during a compassion session I was leading. For me, it honours the everyday practice of being a compassionate person in the world. I think most of us have been both the person offering comfort and the one receiving it when it's needed most. This poem reminds me that compassion is everywhere."

Tamsin
Breathe by Becky Hemsley, from Every Day Is a Fresh Beginning edited by Aoibhín Garrihy
"There isn't a particularly profound reason behind my choice. This year has contained more than its fair share of ups and downs and, while tidying books away, I happened to open this one at random. The poem felt like a gentle, reassuring pat on the head. Sometimes that's exactly what we need."

Whatever You're Into...

Independent Bookshop Week begins today, celebrating the places where readers discover new worlds, unexpected voices and, sometimes, exactly the words they need.
This year's campaign reminds us that "Whatever you're into, there's a book for you. Just ask a bookseller."
At the Poetry Pharmacy, people often arrive looking for something they can't quite name. Comfort after loss. Courage before a difficult conversation. A little more wonder. A little less loneliness.
Booksellers are matchmakers. At the Poetry Pharmacy, we're usually matching people with poems.
This week we'll be joining independent bookshops across the country in celebrating the power of books, poetry and reading. We're also looking forward to the premiere of an exclusive new poem written for Independent Bookshop Week by Matt Goodfellow on Tuesday 16 June at 6pm. Tune in to see a video of Matt reading the poem in his local bookshop, Simply Books at @booksaremybag social media channels at 6pm.

Whatever you're into, there's a book for you. We'd add: whatever you're going through, there's probably a poem for that too.

Join award-winning poets Tahmina Ali, Bob Beagrie and Harry Man for a special evening of conversation presented in partnership with the Royal Literary Fund.

Part of a series of eight events bringing together poets, playwrights, novelists and screenwriters from across Northern England, this thoughtful discussion will explore poetry’s lasting power — how poems can comfort, why certain lines remain with us, and whether poetry can quietly alter the course of a life.

Together, the poets will reflect on how readers encounter transformation through poetry, and on the ways the artform has shaped their own lives. Drawing from the rich archive of the Royal Literary Fund, each writer will revisit the words of some of the country’s most celebrated poets, using them as a starting point for a wider conversation about poetry’s enduring impact.

All are warmly welcome.

Join us and The Offline Project for an in-person, phone-free creative evening designed to help you step away from your screen for a few hours, slow the pace down, and make something with your hands alongside a small group of interesting people.
The Offline Project creates screen-free experiences that encourage real-world connection, creativity and conversation. This evening is a chance to put that into practice.
What to expect : A guided, hands-on creative session (with a high quality notebook to take home)
A unique setting and a small, welcoming group
Phones away from start to finish
Snacks and drinks provided (alcoholic and alcohol-free options)
Conversation and connection as it happens naturally.
* Please note: this event takes place within the open Lush Oxford Street store, so some background noise is to be expected.

Join poet Chrys Salt and musician Richard Ingham for an evening exploring the richness and complexity of North East India.

Rooted in Chrys Salt’s highly regarded collection The Punkawallah’s Rope, and born from her performance at the Kolkata Book Fair, as well as an immersive month spent in Kolkata and North East India, The Punkawallah’s Rope explores the vibrant textures, voices, and contradictions of a continent that is both dazzling and daunting.

Through layered poems and haunting instrumentals - played on a range of Indian instruments, including the aludu, bansuri and gopi yantra, by international musician and saxophonist Richard Ingham - the performance poses the question:

How can a middle-class white woman begin to understand and engage with this most complex and challenging of continents?

The latest Wild Words online course is now open for registration!

In July, we will follow new paths through the undergrowth, feet wet with dew. We will seek out secret blooms and taste forbidden fruit. Gold light will skim the lines of our endless days. We will do the quiet work of creativity. We will share stories around the fire under the summer moon, as it has always been.

Wild Words: Summer will provide you with inspiration attuned to the changing seasons, and help you to build a sustainable, daily creative habit. Suitable for both beginners and experienced writers of prose, poetry, and all forms of creative non-fiction, this course is for anyone who would like to live more creatively, write more, or make an authentic connection with the natural world.

Beginning on the first of July, you will receive a daily writing prompt delivered to your inbox. You can spend as much - or as little - time on each prompt as you like, from ten minutes to two hours. We will write together for the month of July, and the course will finish on the 31st.

Join us to raise a glass to celebrate the launch of Sarah Salway's latest collection, The Hands of a Gardener. A collection which conjures up the magic of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown the man responsible for reshaping the English landscape as we still know it today. It is a story of ambition, social change, and many influential women previously hidden from history.

Sarah Salway is a novelist, poet and short-story writer whose work is rooted in gardens and the natural world. Sarah grew up on a Cambridgeshire herb farm, and her writing has appeared in public parks and gardens, as well as in journals and books. Her previous collection, Learning Springsteen on my Language App, was the joint winner of the Geoff Stevens Memorial Prize.

A former Canterbury Laureate, Sarah trained as a journalist at the London College of Fashion and studied Garden History at Birkbeck, University of London. She currently runs regular workshops on writing and reading for the Royal Literary Fund.

We’ll be exploring the literary landmarks and poetic stories of Marylebone and Soho with Liz Ison, and ending at Oxford Street’s literary landmark, the Poetry Pharmacy. Included in the walk will be tales about Lord Byron, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Katherine Mansfield, Dylan Thomas, William Blake, Shakespeare, Shelley, Oscar Wilde. The aim is to “take poetry for a walk” so we will be including readings along the way.

Ticket price of £38 includes:

• Two hour guided walk with anthologist Liz Ison 
• Delicious refreshments at the Poetry Pharmacy, Oxford Street
• A Poetry Pharmacy bundle of 100 Poems to Grow Your Confidence and a bottle of Confidence Poetry Pharmacy pills

We’ll be bringing poetry and literature off the bookshelves and outside by spending time in one of the capital’s most beautiful parks, St James's Park, seeing how the combined power of poetry and parks can help us to relax and unwind, before further literary wanderings through the districts of St James's and Piccadilly, ending up at the Poetry Pharmacy in Oxford Street.

The walk will finish at the Poetry Pharmacy on Oxford Street for tea and cake where participants will also receive a Poetry Pharmacy goody bag!

Ticket price of £38 includes:

• Two hour guided walk with anthologist Liz Ison
• Delicious refreshments at the Poetry Pharmacy, Oxford Street
• A Poetry Pharmacy bundle of a copy of 100 Poems to Help you Relax, edited by Liz, and your own bottle of Relax pills, specially created to celebrate the publication of this lovely book.