Poet Anna Woodford from South Gosforth was out and about on the Metro when the idea came to her to display thought-provoking poetry at Longbenton Metro station.

The poet was travelling for the first time due to the pandemic when it occurred to her that many other people may feel nervous or excited about getting back to normal as she did, and that poetry may be a wonderful way to record these shared feelings and for others to enjoy them as they go about their day to day life.

The project is in conjunction with Royal Literary Fund Fellows at Newcastle and York Universities, and Metro-operator Nexus who say that they are very “proud” to get behind the art form and display four poems that reflect on the pandemic.

Anna sought out three other poets to get involved with the project and create a positive poem based on the theme of the pandemic.

The other poets are Pippa Little, Penny Boxall and Christy Ducker, and along with Anna’s work, all of the poems have now been turned into large artworks and are currently displayed at Longbenton Metro Station.

Poet Anna Woodford said: “I was on the Metro for the first time in a long time, feeling nervous but excited about some return to normality and thought that a lot of people were probably feeling the same.

The last year has been a brief window in time when everyone has lived through the same experience and poetry is a good way of acknowledging that, capturing the spirit of how we feel about restarting our lives.”

Huw Lewis, Nexus Customer Services Director, said: “Metro has a long history of displaying art on the network, and we were delighted when Anna got in touch about this project, it’s a great idea and the poems look fantastic in the station.

“Placing art and poetry in public places like train stations, where people don’t expect to see it, is a great way of introducing it to the public. I hope these poems will entertain and surprise, provide some inspiration or some comfort and give our customers the opportunity to take a moment of reflection.”

Steve Cook from the Royal Literary Fund said: “We are proud to support many amazing writers across the North East and to help bring their uplifting words to public attention in different ways”.

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