PIG UPDATE #42
27th of September 2026
National Poetry Day is around the corner and with it comes a veritable avalanche of brilliant events, so let's get straight into it.
Events (28 September to 11 October 2026)
The new week starts with a bang on Monday (28 September). SPAM Press' fabulous AFK reading series is back with its eleventh instalment: AFK#11. This one will be more prose-focused with readings from Ameek Gilhotra, Meagan Jennett, Elle Nash, Hannah L. Parkinson, Edwin Stevens and Marianne Tambini, plus music from singer-songwriter Navi Strebor. Doors are at 6:30pm and it's almost sold out, so make sure to grab your free ticket asap. If you'd rather stay at home on a Monday night, Wordsworth Grasmere's online reading group Discover Poetry is back on Zoom at 7:30pm. Hosted by poet Polly Atkin, it's a relaxed evening inviting you to think and chat about a selection of poems - old and new.
Things are getting truly busy on Tuesday, 29 September. You have the choice between the monthly Writing Group at Mount Florida Books, the Poet's Corner weekly open mic at Hillhead Bookclub and The Midnight Verse open stage at The Drake. This month's featured artist at The Midnight Verse is musician Joseph Hewer who will be performing alongside the usual open mic slots. But that's not all! There will also be a poetry reading at The Alchemy Experiment on Byres Road. Sharon Black is celebrating the publication of Things That Fruit in Darkness from 7:30pm. The book is her fifth collection and was recently published by Vagabond Voices. Entry is free.
If you like, you can return to the Alchemy Experiment for more poetry the very next day! Ross Wilcock is hosting his monthly Poetry Experiment open mic back at the same venue on Wednesday, 30 September. As usual, doors are at 7pm and tickets are £5. On Wednesday afternoon, Strathclyde University's Creative Writing community StrathWrites is cordially inviting you to a free poetry workshop with Joey Frances. Hosted by Maria Sledmere, the session explores the relationships between wage labour and poetry, asking how we write about and think through the connections we have in our daily lives.
Thursday, 1 October is National Poetry Day - and there is a lot going on to celebrate this year's theme of Wonder. Glasgow Women's Library is marking the occasion with a special GWL Story Café from 1pm to 2:30pm. Relax over drinks and snacks and enjoy beautiful multilingual poetry readings in Urdu, Punjabi and Pothwari (all with English translations). The event is free and targeted at women. Also during the afternoon, Goldsmiths, University of London is hosting a free webinar titled The Wonder of Words: How poetry helps us see the world differently. Dr Jocelyn Page and Dr Emily Corbett explore how poetry allows adults and young readers to see and question the world in new ways, with a particular focus on children's poetry, voice, rhythm and imagery. Expect a poetry reading, open discussion and audience Q&A. In the evening, Good Press is hosting the Glasgow launch of Knottis by Lindsey Shields Waters from 6:30pm. Waters' sparkling debut collection is written in both English and Older Scots and explores connections between love and memory, humanity and nature, past and present. Also reading on the night are Nuala Watt and Stewart Sanderson. What a brilliant line-up! Entry is free. Meanwhile at Waterstones on Sauchiehall, St Mungo's Mirrorball is staging its National Poetry Day Mirrorball Showcase. The headline poet is Colin Bramwell, reading alongside Roshni Gallagher, Sharon Black, Sarah Stewart and Alison Cohen. Make sure to get there by 7pm. Finally, also at 7pm, the Forward Arts Foundation is marking the special day with Out Loud: A Conversation on Poetry and Performance, an online Young Poets Summit event bringing together poets shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem Performed. The conversation is chaired by poet Chloe Tenesha and is free to attend - make sure to register though.
After a quiet weekend, your poetic diary starts to fill up again on Monday, 5 October, with Ross McFarlane's Candlelight Poetry Open Mic. The event at The Old Toll Bar starts at 7:30pm. Reading slots are 5 minutes and entry is free.
Tuesday, 6 October is another packed day. The monthly free Open Book Creative Writing Session is on at Glasgow Women's Library from 10:30am. Led by poet Kathrine Sowerby, it's a warm and supportive writing session using poetry and short stories as prompts. In the evening, the weekly Poet's Corner open mic returns to Hillhead Bookclub. This week's theme is still tbc, so make sure to keep an eye on the organiser's socials for more details. Also on Tuesday night, City of Poets and SP SQUARE CIC are kicking off their October Poetry Tutorials series with Paranormal Punctuation with Anne Sikking online from 7pm. The hour-long session dives into the terrifying monster that is punctuation, using BREATH as the key underpinning element. Tickets are £15. This is the first of four spooky-themed October tutorials (running on consecutive Tuesdays); you can join one, a few, or all four.
On Wednesday, 7 October it's time for the monthly Poetry at Sweeney's open mic. From 7:30pm, the stage is open for beginners and regulars alike. This is a brilliant, community-focused event, so pop by if you can. Meanwhile online, The Poetry Society is hosting the launch of The Poetry Review Autumn 2026 from 7pm. To celebrate the new issue which was edited by Wayne Holloway-Smith, there will be readings from Jane Yeh, Fiona Benson, Helen Quah and an exclusive recording from Oli Hazzard. The event is free.
To ease you into everyone's favourite spooky month, the Raven Writing Group is hosting a Halloween-themed session on Thursday, 8 October from 6pm. Bring your poetry, fiction or whatever you're working on. There will be an opportunity to share spooky-season work, sweeties are on offer and costumes are welcome. Entry is free but make sure to RSVP via Eventbrite ahead of time.
On Friday, 9 October, DykeHouse Press is launching their new anthology The Rush at The House Arts Collective from 6:30pm. The volume is a collection of heady queer poems exploring impulsive decisions, aching desires, blurry nights out and brief encounters. Readers on the night include Janette Ayachi, Stuart Rawlinson, India Lawrence Glover, Thomas Stewart, Meredith MacLeod Davidson, Luke Worthy and Parel Joy, with electronic music from Texture Texture (Ian Macartney). And what's more: entry is free!
Out-Spoken Press is hosting the online workshop The Myth Maker: Reimagining History, Memory and the Self in Poetry with Nick Makoha on Saturday, 10 October from 1pm. The three-hour session explores how poets draw on myth, personal narrative, history and cultural memory to develop their own myth-making practice. A recording is available for purchase if you can't attend live. Tickets are £30.
The fortnight closes with a double bill on Sunday, 11 October. The 87 Press is running the online workshop A Patchwork Orange with Anthony Anaxagorou from 6pm. The two-hour session explores the orbital poem - how to shape ideas around an organising principle rather than direct or literal modes of address, building a poem that is expansive, open and comprised of various elements. Ideal if you find yourself stuck in logical arcs and are looking for new techniques to choreograph your writing. Tickets are £36.45. Meanwhile over at Clydesdale Cricket Club on the Southside, Good Press is throwing a big birthday bash - the Good Press Birthday Party celebrating fifteen years of the beloved bookshop. From 3pm until late, you get readings and performances from Leo Bussi, Maria Sledmere, Princessa Mangione III & Matt Robin, The Seep, Fritz Welch, Tara Quinn, Michael Kasparis and more, plus food from Southside legends Ranjit's and a kids zine-making table from 3pm. Tickets are £8 in advance and include food. Kids go free. The perfect Sunday, really.
Opportunities
Today's pick from among the long list of opportunities currently on the PIG website:
If you haven't already, you have until the end of September to submit to several excellent publications. Gutter is open for Issue 35 until midnight on 30 September and is particularly keen to receive work in Scots and Gaelic as well as work in translation. You can submit up to three poems totalling no more than 100 lines. Accepted contributors are paid a flat fee of £50.
Also closing on 30 September is The Hythe Review. The journal prioritises experimental poetry and poetics that engage with language, cultural identity and the transgression of colonial bordering. Published writers receive a fee of £100.
You have one additional day to submit to Foglifter. The submission window for Issue 12.1 of this biannual compendium of queer and trans writing closes on 1 October. The editors are keen on daring and thoughtful work by LGBTQ+ voices.
A very special opportunity closing on 1 October is the Dymphna Bursary. The scheme is administered by the Scottish Poetry Library and offers an award of £2,000 to a poet resident in Scotland who identifies as neurodivergent or has a learning disability. It is particularly aimed at poets at a developing point in their early career. Applications can be submitted as a written document, audio or voice recording.
Our final pick is this: missed the boat. Missed the boat is a Scotland-based poetry magazine for anyone who feels like it's too late. While there isn't a specific theme to the call, the editors ask that you reflect about a time you feel you 'missed the boat' in your own life in your bio. Poems that address the broad topic of 'missing the boat' are welcome but not a prerequisite. The deadline is 7 October.
PIG Spotlight
This section is designed to shine a spotlight on a particular website, organisation or feature. For each Update, I'll pick something new - either because it is plain awesome or because it's new or really topical.
The National Poetry Day is an obvious choice for this PIG Spotlight. After all, it is the biggest mass celebration of poetry in the UK! While I personally understand and encourage the event's focus on children and young people, I still think it is a bit of a missed opportunity that the official website is solely focused on this aspect. I would love to see more poetry celebration across the generations!
To make up for this gap, I thought I'd include a little dive into the BBC Radio archives instead to take you on a little tour of some of the brilliant poetry-related programmes you can find there:
Frank Skinner's Poetry Podcast: 30-min episodes exploring anything from Erasure Poetry to William Wordsworth.
Tim Key's Poetry Programme: 15-20 min dips into poetry - each dedicated to a different theme. Anything from accountancy to sleep, cars and superstition.
Poetry Extra: 30-min dive into the BBC archives to uncover some brilliant poetic gems.
Lemn Sissay's Poetry Rebels: 14-min episodes all about performance poetry.
The Verb: Ian McMillan's cabaret of the word, with poetry, new writing and performance (42min each).
This is also where you can catch the highlights from the recent Contains Strong Language Festival.
There is also a dedicated article on Spoken Word at the BBC with a mix of different clips and links to further treasures from the archive.
PIG's Poetry Pick
For today's pick, I selected the winning entry from this year's Sacred Arts Trust Competition for Religious Poems by Poets under Thirty. I might not be particularly religious, but I did really enjoy this one.
30 before 30
by Naomi Reiss
“And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age …”
– Luke 3.23
This year’s the year to renovate the loft
at last. To plan and execute that long-
anticipated siblings’ road trip. See
the city lights. Go on retreat. Hydrate.
Invest in proper walking sandals (John
would know). Do something really nice for Mum.
Attend as many weddings as you can,
failing your own. Get smashed at all of them.
Tell jokes. Yell sometimes. Talk to kids. Do spoken
word. Don’t freak. Don’t panic. Learn the names
and calls of birds. Smell flowers. Skinny dip.
Get some careers advice. (From anyone
but Dad.) Pick up a language. (Greek? Egyptian?)
Figure out at least one kind of wine
you truly like. Declutter. Ditch the socials.
Lift. Embrace your gifts. Learn self-esteem.
Learn boundaries. Get out of Nazareth
at least once monthly. Seize the day. Be brave.
Via the Scottish Poetry Library.
That's it from me today. See you in two weeks!
Love,
Annie