Friday Is Poets Day 
In May 2022 I was awarded a grant from Bristol City Council to create Stone the Crones.
Stone the Crones is a project supporting & celebrating the creative voices of older / aging / elder women in Bristol. The funding was for a monthly spoken word event plus accompanying monthly workshop to create material, develop skills, build confidence & community.
Stone the Crones is about finding our voices and reclaiming the concept of crone as a fierce, strong, wise elder woman.
Stone the Crones spoken word events
BCC funding allowed me to deliver 6 x monthly spoken word nights in Bristol in 2022, with 12 paid headline poets (2 per event), a paid compere and around 50 open mics slots performed by experienced poets and some who had never read their work in front of people before.
The monthly evening events were held in the beautiful café at Windmill Hill City Farm, south Bristol, on the second Saturday of each month.
Hosted by Beccy Golding, the format had open mic slots (with priority going to women who attended the morning workshop), 2 sets from more established older women writers and some silly fun audience participation, ending with some social time – a chance to talk & connect in a welcoming space.
For accessibility information click here.
Saturday morning workshops
Six free workshops were held in a shop space in Broadwalk Shopping Centre, Knowle.
The free workshops were small, welcoming, informal 2-hour sessions open to around 6 women per month. Hosted by Beccy Golding and facilitated by expert writers and group leaders, participants were supported to create a new poem to perform in the evening (if they wished).
Stone the Crones post-funding
Stone the Crones built an amazing, engaged community. Although we are no longer funded we continue to perform and deliver workshops on an ad hoc basis – performing at events such as Lyra Poetry Festival, Word of Mouth and Valley Fest, and delivering free workshops for Bristol Women’s Voice International Women’s Day in 2023 and 2024; for Satellite of Love and for Lyra.
We are keen to find ways to continue the wonderful energy and creativity of Stone the Crones and welcome ideas for collaborations, commissions, funding or other opportunities.
Stone the Crones socials
Cartoonist & activist Kate Evans created the Stone the Crones profile pic, as part of a cartoon strip celebrating International Women’s Day back in 2013. I have always loved the energy, vibrancy and sheer RARGHH of it – this is what I want our monthly events to be like (maybe not with the running off into the sunset naked, but who knows…)
Thanks to Cartoon Kate for giving us permission to use the image.
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Fungal Architecture
This poem was written for the Hot Poets participation project, linking poets & scientists together to imagine a better possible future. During a six-week programme a group of poets were tasked to research the spark of an idea with a positive environmental impact, then connect with a scientist working in that area to find out…
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Writing a bio
It’s a bit fraught, isn’t it, writing a biography? First person, third person?Too self-effacing, too egotistic?Too tongue in cheek, too earnest? I’ll be one of the scratch poets at the wonderful Tonic spoken word night next week – they offered a bit of advance promo if I could supply a short bio. So I dashed…
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Poetry as mindfulness, poetry as noticing
The state of ‘poet’ currently feels like a perpetual state of noticing – noticing what I see and naming it, noticing what I feel and naming it, noticing thoughts and following them until they dwindle or reach a conclusion or until I notice something else. The noticing is about ‘being here’, being mindful of the…
