Calling all performance poets yet to publish a first collection – performance poetry publisher Burning Eye is waiting to hear from you. Burning Eye’s publisher, Clive Birnie, pictured at the London Poetry Book Fair, has issued a submissions call on his website, but adds this warning: “We get many submissions from poets whose work may well have merit, may well have been published by fine journals like the Rialto and Poetry London, but has never been performed. We turn them all down. We only work with performers. This is our niche. But if you are of the performer persuasion, feel free to send in a proposal. Tell us who you are, what you do, how long you have been doing it and what your plans are for the future. In brief.”

He adds: “If you have any doubt about what we publish, then don’t submit. There are 25 Burning Eye books out there in the world to guide you. Buy some, read some, digest, think and ask yourself. Will I stand out in this crowd? Will I add something new to the party? That is what tends to get us whooping and punching the air. If you are digging holes we have already dug then we are less likely to say yay. We get bored easily. Our feet itch and our eyes wander. We like new. We like gutsy. We like oddball, fringe-dwelling weirdos. We like funny. We like experimental. We like young and we like old. The age gap between our youngest and oldest poets published to date is around 40 years. But if you are seriously thinking about submitting to Burning Eye you know this already, right?”

The deadline is 1 June. More details

Background: Reasons to be cheerful at Burning Eye