Against Gravity foreword by Jacqueline Wilson

Against Gravity foreword by Jacqueline WilsonAgainst Gravity: the title alludes to our struggle with mortality as we age and, by contrast, the pleasures of play, imagination, creativity. Robert Saxtons latest poetry book is dedicated to a friend whose heart gave out on a Scottish mountain. But in counterpoint to the elegaic, it offers humour too, often with dark overtones. The subject matter is wide ranging from the late Queen to the pitfalls of indexing, from Neros theatre to trouser suits for

It’s 1986 and 29-year-old Marlo O’Sullivan of London-Irish stock has just found out that his sister is his mother

We never speak of it

a person births a stone from their rectum

The North 48 showcases 143 poems by 82 poets

and novelist Halim Barakat introduced by Bassam Frangieh

and Saeed the Pessoptimist by Emile Habiby

the centre of everyone’s attention

Fatima writes biographies of unknown people living seemingly inconsequential

instead of the dream

Angelina Ayers on Mary Oliver

• 'Poets I Go Back To': writers reveal which poets from the past have most influenced them

cheap thrills and expensive mistakes