Paper Lanterns is an exciting journal of stories, poems, nonfiction, book reviews and art for, and often by, teen and young adult readers. Work by young people sits alongside work by those of us who can remember being young. It’s based in Ireland but open to international submissions, and I was delighted to have my poem My Body Doesn’t Like to be Messed With in the latest edition.
Lots and lots of teens write poetry, and most of them have to study it, but it’s not always easy to find poetry written for this demographic, and so it’s especially great to see a journal like this. If you’re a teacher, the website includes resources for you and there are competitions for young writers to point your students to.
My poem is about body image, a topic very familiar to today’s teens, and dialled up to 11 by the online nature of today’s culture. But it’s been around for ages and it’s my hunch that most of us have a lifelong conversation with ourselves and the world about our bodies, and that sometimes it’s not a friendly chat; it was certainly something that felt right to write about in this context. I’ve been kicking around an idea about developing a writing workshop for KS3 or 4 on this topic, and I’d love to know what teachers thing about that – is it something you would consider booking?
You can subscribe to the twice-yearly journal, buy one-off copies or even buy digital versions of some back-issues here