The Kilkenny County Council Arts Office officially launched the 26th edition of the Kilkenny Poetry Broadsheet during the Kilkenny Arts Festival on the 13th August 2026 in the Parade Tower, Kilkenny Castle. It was successfully launched by Kilkenny Arts Festival Poet in Residence, Annemarie Ní Churreáin and Broadsheet editor Jane Robinson.
The aim of the publication is to give local writers a platform for their work. Being published since 2000, it continues to be a much sought after and treasured platform for writers to expose their work to the public. This year fifteen poems were selected for publication by Irish poet Jane Robinson. The Broadsheet was beautifully illustrated by local designer and illustrator Tim Harper of Wax Botanical.
Poets selected for publication include: Orla Hennessy, Willie-Joe Meally, Gemma Aloisi, John Anderson, Noel Howley, Nora Brennan, Carmel Hogan, Breda Barrett, Janis Woodgate, Frances Moore, Carmel McCluskey, Róisin Power Hackett, Anne Mc Darby Beck, Cormac Leahy, Catherine Cronin.
You can view a digital copy of the Broadsheet here:
BP26 digital high rez
Jane Robinson’s collections, Journey to the Sleeping Whale (Salmon, 2018) and Island and Atoll (Salmon, 2023), as well as other poems and essays, reflect her deep ecological awareness. With a doctorate in Biology from Caltech, Jane is also a recipient of the Shine-Strong and Red Line Book Festival Poetry Awards, as well as the Strokestown International Poetry Prize. Several of her poems have been set to music. Some recent work is published in Archipelago, Howl, Cold Mountain Review, Poetry Ireland Review and The Stinging Fly. Jane lives in Dublin and enjoys leading poetry workshops outdoors where writers might feel the weather on their skin and encounter native wild plants and animals.
Published Poets
Anne Mac Darby Beck was born into a working class family in rural Ireland. She has been driven to write since childhood and believes she writes to understand the world. One of her earliest memories is of being singled out for praise by her teacher for a school essay written from the perspective of a bird of prey. It was a realisation that something she created could have merit beyond the simple enjoyment of writing. She writes poetry and short stories and her work has been extensively published in various magazines, journals and anthologies in Ireland, the UK and USA. She has also won many awards and been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She is a member of a writing workshop set up by the late Michael Massey.
Breda Barrett is living in rural North Kilkenny, wife, and mother to four adult children and has five grandchildren. She is drawn to reading and writing poetry as a way to explore life, nature and how we interact. She is a member of a local poetry group and has attended writing workshops organised by the Kilkenny County Council Arts Office and the Irish Writers Center. She is delighted to have had work published by Kilkenny Broadsheet (2021,2026) and was shortlisted in 2017 and 2022. Her work also featured on the Broadsheet Poetry Phoneline and her poem Lore inspired an art installation by artist Bridget Ní Dhuinne in 2021.
Carmel McCluskey is a multidisciplinary artist. Her practice concentrates on Singing, Dancing and Writing. Her writing explores a rural, farming childhood, ecology and conservation. Awarded a Kilkenny Arts Office Bursary (2025) Carmel completed her Creative Futures Academy, Professional Certificate in Art and Ecology, at National College of Art and Design, Dublin, (2026). Carmel has just returned from a residential Bursary Award, at the 39th John Hewitt International Summer School (Armagh) for which she was selected for Workshops in ‘Memoir: Writing your one Wild and Precious Life’ with Poet and Prose Writer, Marueen Boyle. For her singing, Carmel was awarded an Arts Act Grant (2026) from Arts Office Kilkenny to work with Mentor and Soprano, Sinead Blanchfield. In addition to her solo, and Community choir work, Carmel performed as part of the full choir in the World Premiere run of Michael Gallan’s opera ‘The Curing Line’ at the Kilkenny Arts Festival 2026. As a Producer, Carmel’s Grant Award for Culture Night Late Programme 2026, will see her producing and singing, in her ‘Sing and Swing’ event, with the Hot 4 Jazz Band, a live jazz music and swing dancing event, in Kilkenny City, Culture Night, September 18th.
Carmel Hogan is an emerging writer from Kilkenny. She writes poetry and stories inspired by her life experiences. Carmel was awarded a Mentorship Grant under the Arts Act in 2023 from the Kilkenny Arts Office and successful in her application for the Your Voice Matters Programme 2024 & 2025 from the Kilkenny Arts Office under Creative Coach, Ann Tannam. Her work appears in White Twine and Old Suitcases, a miscellany of poetry and prose, she is published in Drawn To The Light Press, the Kilkenny Poetry Broadsheet 2024 & 2026 and in Kilkenny – The Best of Ireland – Live, Work, Enjoy – A publication by Kilkenny Co. Enterprise Board to promote Kilkenny. Carmel is working on her first poetry collection.
Catherine Cronin is originally from Cellarstown, Co. Kilkenny, but currently lives in Switzerland with her husband, Ivan. She has written for the Irish and Swiss stage. Her poetry and prose have been published in Ireland, Switzerland, the UK and the US, including Poetry Ireland, Broadsheet #25, The Honest Ulsterman, The Ogham Stone, The Kilkenny Observer, Zwischentext, The Storms Journal and The Waxed Lemon.
Cormac Leahy is an eighteen-year-old writer living in Kilkenny. He began to compose poetry early into secondary school, and this is his first time having work published. He is also a folk songwriter who regularly performs and releases original music. His poetry and lyrics are inspired by the mysticism of Ireland, along with whatever magic stirs up the necessary restlessness today. At some point down the line, he’d like to put a harmonious collection of poetry together, but at present he is at work on an album due to go out later this year.
Frances Moore is a Kilkenny-based poet and creative writing facilitator. A past recipient of the Annie Deeny Prize at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre, her poetry and essays have been broadcast nationally on RTÉ Radio 1 (Arena, Sunday Miscellany) and published in print and digital journals, including THE SHOp, Eunoia Review, and the Kilkenny Poetry Broadsheet. Twice, she has been a finalist for the Poetry Collection Competition at Listowel Writers’ Week under adjudicators Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill and Mark Roper. She edited the weekly poetry newsletter Retiring Type on Substack, March 2024 – September 2025. Committed to her local arts community, Frances is a core member of the AfterWords multimedia collective.
Gemma Aloisi is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Ireland. Informed by their background in animation filmmaking, Gemma’s creative practice delicately dances between the worlds of visual art, music, writing, and illustration, and is rooted in a deep love for the living world and for the extraordinary poetry of ordinary days. At the heart of their work is a hope that art can nurture tenderness towards one another and towards our shared home on Earth. They see all living beings as fellow earthlings, and hope their work encourages others to cherish and protect the fragile beauty of life. As a facilitator, Gemma is passionate about creating safe spaces to explore creativity, where children and adults alike can ease into an experience of playfulness, emotional safety, belonging, and joyful connection with their creative self. You can find out more about Gemma’s work by visiting www.gemmaaloisi.com
Janis Woodgate is from Loughboy, Kilkenny. She is foremost a writer of poetry though she is developing creative non-fiction and essay writing skills through her academic studies and continued participation in writing workshops. Janis has recently completed a BA in Arts & Humanities at Carlow College, St. Patrick’s, where she undertook a creative writing dissertation featuring her own poetry and analysis of American poets Gwendolyn Brooks and Mark Doty. Janis won first prize for poetry in the Carlow College Annual Literary Awards in 2023 for her poem ‘Mother, 1975’, and in 2025 for her prose poem ‘Almost Eighteen’. She won second prize in the Cathalbuí Poetry Competition in 2024 for ‘The Ice Age’. Janis is currently a Rhyme Rag workshop facilitator for Kilkenny Arts Office, which she values having herself begun writing through a young writers group established at the Desert Hall in the early 1990’s. Janis’ poems have been published in editions of the Kilkenny Poetry Broadsheet, The Snow Island Review (South Carolina), and The Poetry Ireland Review. Janis will develop a more contemplative style of writing through the MA in Applied Spirituality with SETU Waterford, which she will begin this September.
John Anderson is a writer who lives in Kilkenny. His first published piece was a story in a school magazine in the 1970s. His most recent is the poem ‘Tractor’ for the Kilkenny Broadsheet 2026.
Noel Howley originally from Mooncoin County Kilkenny now lives in Waterford, was runner-up in the Cork Literary Review Manuscript Competition 2002. He has had poems published in various journals including Poetry Ireland Review, Cork Literary Review, Poetry Salzburg Review, Kilkenny Broadsheet, 14 Magazine, Revival Literary Journal, The Honest Ulsterman and The Waxed Lemon. In 2019 he won the Waterford Poetry Prize and Chair of Ireland Student Poetry Prize in 2025. He holds a Masters in Poetry from The Seamus Heaney Centre, Queen’s University Belfast. He read at the Cork International Poetry Festival as part of the Prebooked Poetry Introductions series.
Nora Brennan grew up on a farm outside Inistioge and now lives in Kilkenny city. Her second collection of poems, Still Time, was published by Revival Press in 2024. A prize winner in national competitions including the Jonathan Swift and Francis Ledwidge Poetry awards, her poems have appeared in various publications including The Kilkenny Poetry Broadsheet, The Stony Thursday Book, Skylight 47 and Crannóg. She was a recipient of the ArtLinks Literature Award in 2016 and was chosen as a Mentee on the National Mentoring Programme, Irish Writers Centre in 2020.
Orla Hennessy is a Kilkenny poet and novelist and a member of a Kilkenny Writers group. She is also a member of a local poetry group whose members are well represented in this year’s Broadsheet. Her poem The Monk’s Door was selected for inclusion in the Broadsheet in 2020. Her debut novel The Left House was published in 2025. Orla lives in Kilkenny with her husband.
Róisín Power Hackett is a visual artist, writer, and arts worker. She has an MA in Art and Research Collaboration from IADT and an MA in Art in the Contemporary World from NCAD. Her poetry and essays have been published in various journals including gorse, Tales of the Forest and Skylight 47. She has made artist books and zines and was co-editor of SEED objects of wonder journal. Róisín has been granted Arts Council and Local Authority awards.
Willie-Joe Meally, from Moneenroe, lives in Kilpatrick, Clogh, Co.Kilkenny, is a founder member of Clogh Writers Group. Willie-Joe draws inspiration for his writing from memories, especially his childhood memories of walking through fields and woods and living in the world of nature. A coal miner’s son, Willie-Joe is influenced by the coal mining tradition and likes to record in poems and stories events of the past and the changing landscape and times. He likes to read other writers and poems he learned in national school and to share his work with the wider community.
