We regret to announce that, due to visa issues, Shane Koyczan will no longer be taking part in the panel. However, we are delighted to confirm UK poetry and performance legend Joelle Taylor (winner of the T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry) will now join this panel alongside Georgie Jones, Vanessa Kisuule, Bertel Martin and Lucy English.

Date: Friday 17th April 2026

Venue: Arnolfini (Theatre)

Time: 18:00 - 19:00

Tickets: £5 / £3 / FREE

✅ BSL Interpreted
✅ Captioned (by Heather Casali)
✅ Live Streamed (book a ‘Live Stream Ticket’ at checkout)

✅ All Lyra Fest venues are wheelchair accessible. Access Information Pack available at www.lyrafest.com.

The Power of Poetry

Panel Discussion

Join international, national and local poets for a captivating panel discussion which considers the enduring power of poetry in contemporary life. UK poet and performance legend Joelle Taylor will be joined by: touring UK poet and internet sensation Georgie Jones, former Bristol City Poet Vanessa Kisuule, and celebrated Bristol poet and founder of Bristol Black Writers, Bertel Martin. Chaired by Professor Lucy English, co-director of Lyra Festival and co-editor of Spoken Word in the UK, the panel will discuss the role of spoken word and live poetry in responding to world events and empowering communities, particularly through difficult times. 

ARTISTS:

Georgie Jones:

Georgie Jones is a poet and performer praised for her ‘formidable stage presence and compelling way with words’. A Roundhouse Slam finalist and BBC Words First alum, she has toured the UK, garnered millions of views online and nearly performed with Pitbull (a technicality she refuses to dwell on). Her debut collection And The World Spins Anyway is a love letter to real life, however it shows up; an exploration of the exquisite messiness of modern existence in which Georgie, with her signature wit and warmth, makes the chaos feel, somehow, quite comforting. 

Joelle Taylor:

Joelle Taylor is a queer, working-class author of six plays, a novel, and four collections of poetry. Her 2021 collection, C+NTO & Othered Poems, won the TS Eliot Prize, the Polari Book Prize for LGBT authors, and is currently being adapted for the theatre. She is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a Poetry Fellow at the University of East Anglia. Her latest collection Maryville, released in November 2025, charts the lives of four butch lesbians through five decades of underground queer history and was described as ‘urgent and memorable’ by The Guardian. Joelle is the host and co-curator of Out-Spoken, the UK’s premier poetry and music club, currently resident at the Southbank Centre. She has featured regularly on BBC radio and television, presenting the documentaries Butch, and A Young Girl's Guide to Horror.

Vanessa Kisuule:

Vanessa Kisuule is a writer and performer based in Bristol. She has won over ten slam titles including The Roundhouse Slam 2014, Hammer and Tongue National Slam 2014 and the Nuoryican Poetry Slam. She has been featured on BBC iPlayer, Radio 1, and Radio 4's Woman's Hour, and been invited to perform all over the world from Belgium to Brazil to Bangladesh. Vanessa’s poem on the historic toppling of Edward Colston's statue 'Hollow' gained over 600,000 views on Twitter in three days and is widely taught in schools and universities. She wrote and hosted four series of the popular Radio 4 programme The Poetry Detective. She has two poetry collections published by Burning Eye Books and her work was Highly Commended in the Forward Poetry Prize Anthology 2019. Her debut non-fiction book Neverland: The Pleasures and Perils of Fandom was published in September 2024 with Canongate.

Bertel Martin:

Bertel has been writing since the earlies 80s. His involvement has always been through community/collective work. First with Bristol Broadsides and as a founder of Bristol Black Writers Group.

His writing has been inspired by the everyday and ordinary experiences. Capturing moments, fleeting thoughts and expressions. Some of his work reflects on what has been passed from the ancestors to present day and what will be in the future.

For HeadFirst use only:

Part of Lyra – Bristol Poetry Festival 2026

#LyraFest

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Online/Streamed ✓
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Entry requirements: 16+, any under 18s accompanied by 21+ adult 1:1 ratio — Read more — Read less