Verse MattersVerse Matters harnesses the power of everyday stories, highlighting the strength and inspiration that comes from speaking out proudly in unsettled times. This anthology of poems and prose, edited by award winning Sheffield based writers Helen Mort and Rachel Bower, brings a diverse range of voices to the fore, from celebrated contemporary poets like Malika Booker, Liz Berry and Hollie McNish to first time published writers from home and abroad. What

novelist Albert Cossery

lit up with life’s moments of sudden illumination: a life coach finds an old passport

and including many thought-provoking fiction from Sudan

” Pete Seeger

Coleridge Goode is a thoughtful witness to a fascinating part of jazz history

Mikhail Aizenberg

Extending the collection beyond his trademark urban locale are startling poems for the loved and departed: from the artist Francis Bacon to the poets Arthur Rimbaud and Barry MacSweeney

moving music off the paper is a philosophical consideration of jazz composition

And in a world in which nothing can be taken on trust

+ Muhammad Afifi Matar

translated by George McWhirter

whose scope and variety most of us can only dream about