Sandwell Poets Laureate

01/10/2026

Sandwell Stanzas is proud to announce Morgan Birch as the next headline poet!

Bleakhouse Library | Friday 30th October 2026 | 7pm – 9pm | Halloween Special

Morgan Birch is a psychologist and poet with a taste for intricate rhyming and unusual subject-matter. Whether addressing the politics of cows, the horror of artificial turf or improper goings-on on supermarket travelators, she and her slamming alter-egos are always on a mission to entertain.

Slots are always 3-5 minutes depending on how many sign-ups we have. Attendees can grab one of the 12 open mic slots (plus as many reserves as we can fit) from 6pm until the event starts at 7pm, first-come-first-served. Events are completely FREE and OPEN TO ALL, but donations are welcome and will be Pay As You Feel and are put directly back into the project. This will be an 18+ night, but under 18’s are welcome if they’re accompanied by an adult, with the understanding there will be adult content. Our inclusive spaces are free of hate speech. Please come along and share your support, even if you don't want to read your work. All venues are FULLY ACCESSIBLE.

Bleakhouse Library: Bleakhouse Road, Oldbury, West Midlands, B68 9DS

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/sandwell-stanzas-open-mic-poetry-night-ft-morgan-birch-tickets-2001065303189 (link-in-bio, booking not essential)

This special Sandwell Stanzas open mic night is brought to you in collaboration with , .libraries, funded by , created and hosted by , and supported by arts organisations around Sandwell.

28/09/2026

Would you like to subscribe to our mailing list? We only email once or twice a month about upcoming Sandwell Stanzas open mics or workshops, so you'll be in-the-know about everything that's happening with our project.

Subscribe to Sandwell Poets Laureate for Sandwell Stanzas adverts and updates.

27/09/2026

SAVE THE DATES

The full, ACE-funded series is almost upon us! We now have all library venues confirmed across the 2026-27 open mic poetry night and workshop series for Sandwell Stanzas, the project designed to bring a greater cohesion to Sandwellian writers, and create a safe and welcoming space for poets to perform and hone their craft from page to stage.

Individual posters announcing headliners for each event will be posted regularly, so keep your eyes peeled - you can also join our mailing list to get sneak-peaks at the upcoming events. Email [email protected].

We have further exciting announcements coming very soon, as if we haven't filled you with enough glee already! Thank you to everyone who has come to our events so far; we couldn't do this without you, and this project is all about the thriving poetry community, that continues to delight and surprise us at every turn.

Charlotte Louise, AccessAbility Arts CIC, Sandwell Libraries, Arts Council England

26/09/2026

Last night...
.. was filled with incredible poetry, prose, music, and comedy for our crossover with Oldbury Rep! What a feast for the ears, as every performer gave us something unique to sink our teeth into.

In hopefully the first of many collab open mic events with the theatre, we are most grateful to have been able to host this night in such a beautiful, historical building in Langley (it used to be a church many moons ago, and is now a shrine for the performing arts and beyond).

Glyn Phillips, despite not feeling too chipper, absolutely knocked it out of the park with his twenty minutes headline set, giving us plenty of chuckles and ponderings!

A massive thanks to AccessAbility Arts CIC, Oldbury Rep and all their volunteers and staff, Alex, and of course our beautiful audience and open micers.

The next event is back in Sandwell Libraries, where Morgan Birch will grace Bleakhouse Library on 0ctober 30, 7-9pm, for another 18+ phenomenal night of pure poetry.

25/09/2026

Photos by Alex Cashmore

25/09/2026

Photos by Charlotte Louise

21/09/2026

Monday 21 September — 12–1pm

🎤 THIS FRIDAY! 🎤

Sandwell Stanzas is heading to Oldbury Rep for a special crossover open mic night! 🎭✨

We’ve got Glyn Phillips joining us as our headline act, alongside an open mic packed with poetry, music, comedy and spoken word.

📅 Friday 25 September
⏰ 7–9pm
📍 Oldbury Rep
🎟️ FREE / Pay As You Feel

You don’t have to perform to come along — listeners and supporters are every bit as welcome as our open mic performers. 💚

Come and spend your Friday night celebrating local creativity with us!

31/08/2026

ANNOUNCEMENT 📢

Sandwell is one of the lowest scorers for the arts in the entire UK... That's about to change.

Sandwell Stanzas has been funded until October 2027! Arts Council England has kindly accepted our project proposal to continue hosting our open mic poetry nights around Sandwell, through lottery funding, and it will be bigger than ever!

We have now included workshops - run by AccessAbility Arts and several external facilitators - as a part of the series, and a poetry competition resulting a legacy anthology (more info on this to come soon), on our ultimate quest to bring a Sandwell Poets Laureate programme to the borough next year!

This is an exciting time to be living in and around Sandwell, and we are so grateful to ACE and the lottery for this funding to continue our project. We've met a multitude of amazing poets on our journey so far - from seasoned pros to first timers - and we can't wait to do it for another year. It has been a truly fulfilling experience.

Still in collaboration with Sandwell Council and AccessAbility Arts, Sandwell Stanzas will be touring as many of the 19 Sandwell libraries as possible, with a workshop and event happening every month from October 30th! We have the venues mostly pinned down already, as well as an INCREDIBLE set of 12 headliners, and each individual poster for the events will have the locations included. For now, please put the dates in your diaries... We want to see your lovely faces and hear your gorgeous poems.

THANK YOU to everyone who helped us along the way, especially Jonathan Davidson from Writing West Midlands, Stacey from Sandwell Council and all the Sandwell Libraries staff, DK DK from AccessAbility Arts and the rest of the access team, those who have volunteered at the events so far (especially Alex), and everyone who gave us feedback to support the funding bid.

Peace & love, Charlotte Louise

PS. Don't forget to come to our collab night with Oldbury Rep before this series starts - it'll be super cool!

30/08/2026

Sandwell Stanzas is proud to announce Glyn Phillips as the next headline poet, for our special crossover event with Oldbury Rep!

Oldbury Rep | Friday 25th September 2026 | 7pm – 9pm

Glyn the Poet: The Man, The Myth, The Moustache

Glyn is a Black Country poet, spoken word performer and multiple slam winner (including being the 2026 Wolverhampton Literature Festival Poetry Slam Champion) with three published books under his belt. Over the last 13 years he has built an unrivalled live reputation as a highly engaging poetical storyteller with a flair for theatricality, joyful yet anarchic wordplay and exuberant yet meticulous wordsmithery. He’s also prone to be very silly at times. However, at heart he is a keen observer of the fragility of the human condition and an impassioned advocate for love, kindness and understanding. Glyn also possesses a rather splendid moustache - if you like that kind of thing of course!

This open mic night will be open to poetry, comedy, and music – slots are always 3-5 minutes depending on how many sign-ups we have. Attendees can grab one of the 12 open mic slots (plus as many reserves as we can fit) from 6pm until the event starts at 7pm, first-come-first-served. Events are completely FREE and OPEN TO ALL, but donations are welcome and will be Pay As You Feel and are put directly back into the project. This will be an 18+ night, but under 18’s are welcome if they’re accompanied by an adult, with the understanding there will be adult content. Our inclusive spaces are free of hate speech. Please come along and share your support, even if you don't want to read your work. All venues are FULLY ACCESSIBLE.

Oldbury Rep: Barlow Theatre Centre, 14 Spring Walk, Oldbury, West Midlands, B69 4SP

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/sandwell-stanzas-oldbury-rep-open-mic-tickets-1998451940551

This special Sandwell Stanzas open mic night is brought to you in collaboration with AccessAbility Arts and Oldbury Rep, created and hosted by Black Country lass Charlotte Louise, and supported by arts organisations around Sandwell.

29/08/2026

We had a bostin' time last night with AccessAbility Arts and our incredible open micers for our online Sandwell Stanzas! 🎉

A thoroughly enjoyable evening, we had no headliners to showcase the beautiful voices of stanzas we've heard so far, as well as plenty of new poets, which we are always delighted to hear. 🥰

Thank you all for popping online with us, and if you're in Sandwell, join us for the next in-person open mic event at Oldbury Rep, 25th September, 7-9pm, sign ups from 6 onwards, bar available at the theatre, open to comedy, music, AND poetry, headliner Glyn Phillips! It's gonna be a doozy. 🔥

Big up DK for setting up and managing the zoom and Charlotte Louise for planning and hosting. 💪