Máire ('Moya') Brennan – d. April 13th 2026

If the rain owned a voice
it would sound like you.
It would settle like dew,
a shimmer of glissando,
the plainsong of a people
who still believe that
music is the cláirseach
that strums the soul. 

Read about Moya Brennan here

Afrika Bambaataa – d. April 9th 2026

I mourn the rhythm but not the man,
wondering how such unforgiving beats
could spring from one so unforgivable.
Yes, there is a corner of the dance floor
saved for you, but no-one dances there. 

Read about Afrika Bambaataa here

Asha Bhosle – d. April 8th 2026

An earnest starlet frames the words
of a song. A voice that is not hers
melts through celluloid like a wave
of heat; the Piaf of Mumbai, a ghost
that sings through her, beyond her. 

Read about Asha Bhosle here

Doug Allan – d. April 8th 2026

When the planet is saved
it will name its roll of friends,
those few who truly saw it
in its most fragile moments,
who turned their lens upon it
to show an imploring world
looking at us square in the eye. 

Read about Doug Allan here

Glen Baxter – d. March 29th 2026

There is a spectrum of the absurd
which reads like this: Kafka, Python,
Zappa, Sisyphus, Trump, Milligan,
Baxter, though tomorrow these names
will be sung in Esperanto by a dingo.

Read about Glen Baxter here

Mary Rand – d. March 27th 2026

The jump is all we ever know;
the run-up of youth, building
speed for our stadium days,
the explosion into the air of
our prime, then the descent,
the hope we might all leave
our impression in the sand. 

Read about Mary Rand here

Valerie Perrine – d. March 23rd 2026

The camera loves those who deal
in damage; wives wed to madness,
showgirls who smile to reveal just
how broken they are, who play a role
only to find the role is playing them. 

Read about Valerie Perrine here

Chuck Norris – d. March 19th 2026

I know facts about Chuck Norris:
they invented a new colour for him
for a belt beyond black; even when
he played a bad guy he was good;
all his movies were really about him.

Read about Chuck Norris here

Tom Georgeson – d. March 18th 2026

Among the angst and anger of a nation
in decline was the ubiquitous Scouser;
weary, resigned, speaking the life of a
worried man, waiting for a punch from
above to knock him into the next scene.

Read about Tom Georgeson here

Len Deighton – d. March 15th 2026

They are holding a funeral
for an insubordinate spy;
somewhere cold and damp,
while a seedy war rages
in the shadows. A man in
NHS glasses drafts a final
report, for our eyes only. 

Read about Len Deighton here

Jenni Murray – d. March 12th 2026

There are stories that half of us strain
to hear over the babble of small print.
Broadcast this message to the unheard
and unseen: turn your radio on. You have
one hour. There’s not a minute to lose.

Read about Jenni Murray here

Country Joe McDonald – d. March 7th 2026

And it’s 1-2-3, what were you fighting for?
The music of sanity in an insane world.
And it’s 5-6-7, open up the pearly gates;
the lost patrol of the counterculture is here,
sounding off one-two in furious ragtime.

Reda about Country Joe McDonald

Jane Lapotaire – d. March 5th 2026

There is a silence in the wings, then
the boards creak, bearing the weight
of an entrance. The first line is spoken
in a voice rustling like stage curtains,
billowing out into breathless theatre.

Read about Jane Lapotaire here

Kenith Trodd – d. March 1st 2026

I choose television;
television without fear,
that sings while others shrug,
that shows the idiot in the lantern
before pulling back to show
ourselves in uncomfortable focus. 

Read about Kenith Trodd here

Neil Sedaka – d. February 27th 2026

Welcome to 1619 Broadway, a place
where writers search for Sixteen
among the keys of an old piano,
where songs pay five dollars a line,
but everybody knows them by heart. 

Read about Neil Sedaka here

Jesse Jackson – d. February 17th 2026

I fell into the company of marchers standing
at the foot of a rainbow, half way between the
mountain and the ghetto. Their leader told me
in a voice of fire Progress is not walking away
from something bad, but marching towards it. 

Read about Jesse Jackson here

Robert Duvall – d. February 15th 2026

If this were your poem, it would ring
with authenticity; it would choose its
words with care, deliver them like an
obscure gospel. But this poem is mine,
and if I say it's safe to write this poem,
then it's safe to write this poem. 

Read about Robert Duvall here

John Virgo – d. February 4th 2026

Our lives depend on how
the pack splits. Some can
plan the future three shots
ahead; others rattle the jaws
of fate’s pocket, never knowing
where the cue ball may be going.

Read about John Virgo here

 

Catherine O’Hara – d. January 30th 2026

Let's get your old folk duo back together
to sing your naive ballads. Let's go out to a
Dog Show, or an alternative Oscars where
they give out statues for vanity and mischief,
where there's no script, but everybody laughs.

Read about Catherine O'Hara here

Nigel Ogden – d. January 27th 2026

The console lights come on; a hiss
of pneumatics before the 64-footer
clears its throat, audible from space.
Hands blur across four banks of keys;
the organist entertains, an orchestra
of ten fingers and a chorus of titans.

Read about Nigel Ogden here