Finding the Words with Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana, S.L. Holm and Di Slaney

Come and listen to some of the best poets from Yorkshire and beyond at Finding the Words, our relaxed and welcoming online poetry evening.

Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana is a poet and teacher living in Newcastle-upon-Tyne.Her first poetry collection Sing Me Down from the Dark (SALT 2022) is in its third issue. She teaches workshops for The Poetry Business, The Writing School and The Writing Well, specialising in Japanese cultural concepts and forms and, in November 2024, she visited Japan and gave a presentation on zuihitsu, at The Japan Writers Conference, in Futaba. Alexandra has been placed and shortlisted in many competitions including The Oxford Brookes International Poetry Prize, The Fish Prize, the Troubadour Prize, and The Winchester prize, and she was longlisted for the 2023 National Poetry Competition. This year, her newest poems are published or forthcoming in The North, Anthropocene, The Interpreter’s House, The Madrid Review, Obsessed with Pipework and The Newcastle Centre for Literary Arts anthology. She was also the featured contemporary poet for an issue of English Review (Hodder education). She has performed poems internationally at the American Writers Program conference, in Portland, Oregon, in Holland and Japan, and at several U.K venues including the Wee Gatherin, Tears in the Fence, and the Leeds Poetry festivals.

S.L. Holm grew up in Massachusetts and came to the UK at nineteen to attend drama school. She has been a professional actor and then a lecturer and academic researcher, writing extensively on Native American, First Nations and Indigenous Literatures. Longlisted for both Mslexia’s single poem competition and this year’s Plough Prize, her poems have appeared in Beyond the Walls, Consilience (Editor’s pick) and Long Poem Magazine. She currently lives in York and is working on her first collection of poems exploring the immigrant origins of her family and the histories and environments of New England where they lived and worked.

Di Slaney lives on the edge of Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire where she runs livestock sanctuary Manor Farm Charitable Trust and independent publisher Candlestick Press. She was the winner of The Plough Poetry Prize 2022, Slipstream Open 2023, Four Corners 2015 and Brittle Star 2014 poetry competitions. She came second in the McLellan English Poetry Competition 2024. Her poems have been broadcast on BBC Radio 4, widely anthologised, and highly commended in the Forward Prize 2016 and Bridport Prize 2020. Journal publications include Poetry Wales, Popshot, Magma, The Rialto, The Interpreter’s House, Iamb, Raceme, Brittle Star, Long Poem Magazine, Humana Obscura, Modron Magazine, Aimsir and Ambient Receiver. Her first collection Reward for Winter was published in 2016 and second collection Herd Queen in 2020, both by Valley Press. Her third collection Hard Graft is due from Valley Press in 2025, and illustrated pamphlet January conversations, with dogs has just been published, available now from the Valley Press online bookshop  Di is Poet in Residence at Nottinghamshire Local History Association.

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