Name: Placeholder Poetry #6: Rachel Goodman + Elvire Roberts, Verity Spott, Christina Thatcher
Start: 2025-09-04T18:45:00+01:00
Location: The Bookshop Alehouse

⚡Placeholder Poetry #6: Rachel Goodman + Elvire Roberts, Verity Spott, Christina Thatcher
🗓️Thursday 4th September 2025
⏲️6.45pm doors | 7pm start | 9pm readings end
🍻[the bookshop alehouse] Southampton
Placeholder is home for poetry readings of the avant-garde, challenging, queer and radical. Following the success of this poetry reading series in Brighton. This special format is thriving in Southampton - presented in collaboration with Wire Wool Events.
Rachel Goodman and Elvire Roberts read together from Knee to Knee (Dialect Press) - a ground-breaking, synergetic poetry book where the poets combine to expand the boundaries of ‘she’. Each poem is co-written.

Rachel Goodman is a poet and painter living in Norfolk. Her work has been published in Magma, Aesthetica, Under the Radar, Finished Creatures, Dream Catcher, The Alchemy Spoon, Ink Sweat & Tears, Lighthouse Journal, Fenland Poetry Journal, Tears in the Fence. She was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize 2017 and 2021. Her first book, Knee to Knee, a collaboration with poet Elvire Roberts, was published in 2024 by Dialect Press. She is currently collaborating with composer James McConnel on a choral anthem commissioned to celebrate the Kings Lynn Festival's 75th Anniversary.
Elvire Roberts is a Queer poet and signed language interpreter. She is widely published in journals including 14 Magazine, Dark Mountain, Finished Creatures, Magma, Reliquiae, The Rialto, Tears in the Fence, Tentacular, and anthologies The Language of Salt, Ten Poems About Getting Older and Apocalyptic Landscape. Her debut pamphlet is North by Northnorth (Five Leaves Press). Knee to Knee (Dialect Press) is a collaborative, synergetic poetry book, each poem co-written with Rachel Goodman.
Verity Spott is a poet and musician. Verity runs Iodine Press and Horseplay in Brighton. Verity's books include Gideon, Balconette and Effort To No. The North Road Songbook is out now from Pilot Press.
Christina Thatcher grew up between a farm and a ranch house in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. She won a Marshall Scholarship to study in the UK and now lectures at Cardiff University. Her poetry and short stories have been widely published in literary magazines, including Ambit, Poetry Wales, The North and The Poetry Review. She has published three collections with Parthian Books: More than you were (2017), How to Carry Fire (2020) and Breaking a Mare, which launched in April 2025. She lives with her gardener husband, Rich, and their cat, Miso.

This event is a toiletries donation point for Basics Bank.
Raffle prizes are books - proceeds go to Yellow Door.
Price: £5 adv
Limited seats available, book in advance to avoid disappointment.
18+