Kane Crookes

My name is Kane Crookes, and I am a 22-year-old poet who’s influenced by imagism. I regularly write tercets, quatrains, haikus and haibuns. But I’m not afraid to exceed four lines! Sometimes, I like to think they take control. Currently, I am completing a master’s in creative writing at Durham, throughout which I am becoming obsessed with objects and poetic objects. These mostly make the title. Altogether, my poems aim to create a puzzle for the reader.

During my time at Durham, me and the other creative writers have worked together in publishing Durham’s 2026 Peninsula anthology, for which I was one of the poetry editors. While editing poems, I learned the importance of handling someone else’s work with both care and poetic drive. Editing is an art, and I am glad my journey’s brought me to The Poetry Lighthouse. My poem ‘River of Flowers’ was published on here last year!

I studied English for my undergraduate degree, during which I fell in love with writing poems. This happened in first year when I came across the 2023 Poetry Prize. By the end of third year, I published two collections entitled ‘Blooming Us’ and ‘Piano Keys out of Breath’ with the help of Grosvenor House Publishing. Both books are infused with nature and I applied my fondness of it to academia.

Supervised by Dr Matthew Foley, my dissertation was called ‘The Willow, the Nettle, the Daisy’: Representations of Fruit, Floral and Moonglow Imagery from Victorian to Modernist Poetry’. I like to think my research was colourful. But overall, I continue to be curious about the natural world!