After a stellar reading from Michelle Diaz in September, Chrissy Banks and I are pleased to welcome you to Uncut’s October poetry event featuring Lesley Curwen and the Black Ven Stanza Group.
🎙️ Lesley Curwen is a poet from Plymouth who spent many years as a reporter and correspondent for the BBC.
🎙️ She is a winner of the 2026 Live Canon Pamphlet Competition and came third in the 2026 Magma Judge’s Prize.
🎙️ Lesley has published three pamphlets, including Permanence (Atomic Bohemian, 2025) a collaboration with research chemist Stephen Paul Wren about the threat of microplastics. She has also written about her family’s experience of forced adoption and mental illness.
🎙️ Lesley’s poems have been published by 14 magazine, Magma, Aftershock Poetry, Under The Radar, The Poetry Business, Alchemy Spoon and Broken Sleep, and some have been nominated for Forward and Pushcart prizes.
🎙️ The Black Ven Stanza Group is facilitated by Sarah Acton and Matt Bryden. Monthly meetings are primarily aimed at editing and providing feedback on work-in-progress poems, for personal development and to encourage performance, submission or publication.
🎙️ Their new zine, The Silken Twine, will be on sale at this event.
✨ Open mic spots available
📅 Tickets £5 on the door
🎤 Don’t you dare miss it!1 w
Uncut Poets is a monthly poetry night which meets on the last Tuesday of the month at the Exeter Phoenix, and online on the second Tuesday of the month.
It is co-hosted by Chrissy Banks and myself. Recent readers have included Greta Stoddart, Fiona Benson, Vishvantara, Tom Weir, Chaucer Cameron and Helen Dewbery, Carrie Etter, Claire Crowther, Alasdair Paterson, Lynne Wycherley, Endre Ruset and Harry Man.
Open-micers are welcomed, and those interested in reading at either the live or online event should contact Chrissy Banks in the first instance at chrissybankspoems@gmail.com.
Booking link: https://exeterphoenix.org.uk/events/uncut-poets/
For more information and bookings, please see the Exeter Phoenix website.