The Alchemy Spoon Issue 4: Body: The Body Issue

The story of The Alchemy Spoon is borrowed from Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist, with the spoon representing the importance of balancing creativity and career. We encourage poets to allow the oils of creativity to fall from their spoons in exchange for the pleasure of creating and having their poetry published.

The Alchemy Spoon is a platform for poetry without prejudice especially of race, gender or age. We are particularly interested to invite poems from new phase poets. These are poets who have come late to poetry, often following retirement, or a life-change.

The work of new phase poets often has stunning depth and perspective reflecting experiences accumulated from work and life. These poets might be classed among those who have been dubbed the 'lost generation of talent'. Abid Hussain, Diversity Director at the AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council), says: ‘How many would-be working-class artists, artistic directors, choreographers, composers and curators decided to enter accounting, legal, medical and engineering professions instead?’

The Alchemy Spoon aims to demonstrate that this talent was not lost but waiting for a reappraisal of priorities, an unleashing of latent creativity, waiting for its time.

The magazine appears three times a year online, with print copy available through ‘print on demand’. We welcome submissions from both established and unpublished poets, and will devote a significant proportion of each issue to new voices, particularly new phase voices.