Join us this week for a special men's mental health podcast in collaboration with Movember. It's not easy out there. Juggling responsibilities, craving rest where there is little time, keeping struggles to yourself. Life can be a very difficult thing to navigate, and today's episode we hope to help with some honest chat interwoven between poems from both established voices and new writers sharing gifts to help through darker days. A special thank you to Daragh Fleming who has created a ...

We are paying tribute this week to the late writer and researcher of all things Irish, Manchán Magan who has departed our current world for the next one. We talk about his influence on the recent fire under the belly of Irish culture and share a few pages of his book '99 Words For Rain'. Good news for the artists of Ireland came in the form of the basic income scheme for artists being stamped as permanent. We hear from writers, playwrights and poets on what this news means and the reality of ...

Alright, alright, alright...it was too tempting to type so leave us alone. How else do you expect us to start this podcast description when we're celebrating the poetry of Matthew McConaughey? Exactly. There are many poems we could have shared from his new books 'Poems and Prayers' but we went with Tips Included. Its a 2 hour listen to complete the audiobook, so create some space in your week and listen to his new book on Spotify asap. After a week in Benalmadena, Ryan came home to Irel...

We have a chonky boy of an episode for you this week! Due to the magical powers of our sound man, the wonderful Finn O'Reilly (@finnreuben), we present to you our Culture Night episode recorded live at The LAB in Dublin. This episode is an absolute banger, where we cover everything from poetry, comedy, storytelling and music ( interpretive dance doesn't transfer over to audio very well sadly). First up we have the amazing Aoife Dunne (@aoife_is-never_dunne) who opens up our show ...

We don't agree with CMAT, even though we love her. We think Larkin would have been her biggest fan. Not yet discussed on the podcast, we share Aubade one of Larkin's masterpieces. We then talk about that ability of turning the mundane into art a lot on today's show. We also talk about men, and the value of the stories of men. We also talk about the almost zero value in male advice without a story. Leon reads out a piece from Ernest Hemingway that hammers home the violence and devastating mani...

The President of ireland has a spoken word album Let us do that one more time for you. The President of Ireland has a spoken word album. What a sentence, and you know what, it’s a brilliant piece of work. We discuss the release with chairman of Claddagh Records James Morrissey about the release, spoken word in Ireland and how the project came to be. If you were at the live podcast of Keep It Light with Deidre O’Kane and Emma Doran at Electric Picnic, you’d have also heard the pr...

This podcast is an absolute must listen if you were lucky enough to be at the Oasis concert last weekend at Croke Park. Leon was there, and spends a lot of this podcast gushing over Liam and Noel Gallagher, which we should all be here for. We look then to the Glastonbury of Ireland, Electric Picnic which kicks off August 29th. We take the best poetry of the festival and give you a peak into what is coming at The Word stage this year. We also have Jan Brierton on, sharing the schedule fo...

On today's pod, we celebrate the release of the second album from For Those I Love, as well as hearing Olivia Rodgrido’s advice about poetry being the foundation for all songwriting, which we’d be on board with. We also dive into the work of Nikita Gill the hidden-in-Instagram-captions genius poetry from Teyindhi Ramsewak and talk about Alice Kinsella’s new collection ‘The Ethics of Cats’ We also share a powerful and completely unique poem about Joan Of Arc by Pip McGough that’ll get your b...

Difficult third series? F*** that! We missed you guys and are delighted to return to your moistened ears as you go on your jog around the park that you hate to help you through another 5k. Or whatever you're up to listening to us, we're very bloody grateful. We have had a lovely few months off, so lots to fill you in on. From poems in English village pubs to bopping to The Fleadh. As for poems, we've both been writing a ton so have some poems to share, as well as poems from the competit...

Our last podcast was our 50th show lads. 50! Mad. On Monday, we have a load of poems and stories for, starting with some info about our live podcast at Swords Castle next Saturday with Wavin Words where there’s also a young poets slam for anyone between 14-18 years of age. If you know of a future world champion slam poet, bring them. Speaking of being inspired by young people, thanks to Katriona O'Sullivan sharing a post a few weeks back, we have poetry from Reece, who penned a powerful poe...

We’re back not with a bang lads, but a SLAM! We were at the International Literature Festival Dublin this week as Leon hosted this year’s Slamovision with @rising.tide.events The place was packed, and the performances on the night were insane. A night where artists stepped up one-after-another to tell stories that need to be told from voices that needed to be heard. We were able to grab a chat with the winner Cat Brogan @cat.brogan who shivered with us and had a chin wag about poetry and l...

Tristram Fane Saunders, Poetry In Liverpool And The Hillsborough Disaster This week, we look back on our incredible weekend in Liverpool hosted by Rachel and Hayley at Giz A Word (Instagram @gizaword.collective) where we met some of the city’s creatives and got a taste of what Liverpool is all about. Spoiler: Karaoke and non-stop craic Instagram handles of the lovely folk in question: @racheywilts @twistedtales.hlg19 @sketchedbyneve @garyharperart @body_confidence22 @petesartpage&nb...

Understanding Masculinity Through Poetry Well, we give it a go anyway and thank the fecking lord we have poetry to help us. We’re share a piece from ourselves as well as work from Simon Armitage, Ursula Walshe and Hayley Gordon Want to say a massive thank you to everyone we met in Liverpool this weekend. Everyone was so sound, what a night the Giz A Word girls Hayley and Rachel run. Enjoy the podcast and have a whopper Bank Holiday! Poems from the pod: Simon Armitage - I Am Very ...

We have pretty much everything covered this week. We read a note from Albert Camus, a poem written by Easter Rising leader Padraig Pearse about his mother and we have issues pronouncing Hercule Poirot Lots of beautiful poems are snuck between those bits, but a special highlight is hearing from Jameson Newell. An American trans man living in Ireland, Jameson opens up on what it’s like living and existing since the trans rights of Americans were revoked this year. Thank you Jameson for sharin...

A very special podcast this week as we invite Luain Press's Lee Sheridan to discuss his brand new anthology collection Luaina! We were delighted ourselves to be involved in the collection, not just because being published is good craic, but we are alongside some of Ireland's most talented spoken word performers and artists. After Lee attended the book launch of Sean Watmore's debut poetry book, he was inspired by the Dublin poetry scene and the collection of minds and artists in the room supp...

We go missing a week and we give you over an hours worth of bleeding poetry! We did go on a bit today, but crammed into the corners of our nonsense waffle are poems that will bring us all down to earth a little and focus on what is bloody important in our lives! Thank f*** for poetry! Kate Ireland's spoken word masterclass on sitting with her Granny kicks off the show this week. Be warned: you will get shivers. Leon had been at the helm of the Dublin Is Tallaght event this week at the Civic T...

Bloody hell do we have jam packed podcast for you this week guys. We have a love story to kick things off that happened at Mulligans pub on Poolbeg Street that ended at The Cobblestone where a woman from Peru had lost a poem gifted to her by a Welsh traveller. Just when you thought Ireland couldn't get any more fecking romantic! We share the essay published by The New York Times that moved actor Andrew Garfield to tears, how Moai from Moana can be a useful inspiration for depression and share...

Inspired by our conversation with Mike Garry about musicians writing poetry, we wanted to dedicate this episode to our favourite artists who also enjoy a poem or too. Leon owns a copy of 'The Lords And The New Creatures' by The Door's frontman Jim Morrison, his only poetry collection so we had to talk about him, his mad blood-drinking, pagan mentalness as well as share a poem from him. We take a look at a poem by Leonard Cohen taken from his collection 'The Flame' published in 2018 with...

We have the honour and privelege to bring you to a very special conversation. Mike Garry is a Manchester poet who's stories and perspectives on life will give you the inspiration you didn't know you needed to live your days to the fullest. We chat to Mike about his upcoming tour around Ireland, the power of reading for the disadvantaged and his ability to speak everyone's language in a way they haven't heard before. Alongside our chat, we discuss Wu-Tang Clan's RZA on the Stephen Colbert show...

A special episode from Poetry's Dead HQ this week as we celebrate the life and work of Dublin's poetic voice, Pat Ingoldsby We sit and listen to our beautiful community of poetry heads who share their favourite poems of Pat with us so we can share them with you. We hope this podcast does him justice and people can always come back to this show if they are looking for some warmth, a giggle and a cry all in the same hour Pat, we were always big fans and thank you for being the lighter voice we ...