Organising Team

Kemal became Chair of the Wirral Poetry Festival in 2022.  He also chairs the Chester Poets and is one of three presenters at First Thursday which meets in Lingham’s Booksellers on the first Thursday of each month. He  has run numerous workshops and has a diverse body of work which has appeared in Chester Poets’ Anthologies since 1981, Purrfect Poems Dream Well Writing (2020), Coed Cybi Poets Publishing (2021), Poetry Scotland, Poetry Cornwall, The Jabberwocky Green Book, and on-line in Three Drops of the Cauldron.

His poem Northwich: Four Bare Miles was shortlisted for the 2020 Cheshire Award for Literature and was published in their anthology Unlocked.  His pamphlet There Will Be Dancing, was published by Red Squirrel Press in 2020.

Judy Ugonna OBE lives in Wirral. Since 2011 she has been one of the lead volunteers involved in the planning and delivery of Wirral Festival of Firsts. One of the volunteer directors of the new Wirral Festival of Firsts Community Interest Company, she chairs the inaugural Wirral Poetry Festival.

Judy has won several prizes and commendations for her poetry. She was a member of Poem Shed, and helped to run Poem Catchers poetry writing workshops and Zest Open Floor Poetry in Chester for several years. Before that, she worked internationally.

Celia Gentles is a poet and artist/illustrator who likes walking, gardening and watching wildlife documentaries. She takes her inspiration from these subjects when painting and writing about nature, sometimes nature’s darker side.

Her favourite genre is magical realism. She loves working in the community with poetry and craft workshops, and enjoys singing in a local choir.

Alison Schultz is a poet and musician with a background in teaching up to Post-Graduate level.

She hosts a performance night, The Wordsmithery, and performs with a guitarist at Art Centres and galleries.

She has run a number of successful Poetry sessions and Picnics for the Festival and has 2 volumes available on Amazon. 

Jeremy Dixon is a prize-winning poet, performer, workshop leader and maker of Artist’s Books. His poetry has appeared in Anti-Heroin Chic, Butcher’s Dog, Found Poetry Review, Impossible Archetype, Lighthouse Journal, Poetry Wales, Queerlings, Roundyhouse and other print and online magazines.

He is the author of the pamphlet In Retail (Arachne Press, 2019). His first full collection A Voice Coming From Then (Arachne Press, 2021) won the Wales Book of the Year Poetry Award 2022. He is also co-editor of the forthcoming LGBTQ+ poetry anthology Joy/Us: Poems of Queer Joy (Arachne Press, 2024).      

Photo credit – Garnett Frost 

Judith Railton is an artist, poet, photographer and musician who worked continually over the pandemic with the Poetry Festival team to enable and present Zoom workshops and online poetry picnics. Continuing to present outdoor picnic workshops with the team and collaborate with the year long Festival program.

She brings a long experience of running textile and creative writing workshops and heading up an international exhibiting group to the mix.

Ali Harwood is an artist, poet, writer and teacher. He was the 2023 Artist/Creative of the Year for the Liverpool City Region and most recent Artist in Residence at Kingsley & Co Children’s Bookshop. He is the author and illustrator of the popular ‘Liverpool Liver Birds’ poetic picture book, the host of the Liver Bards poetry event and appreciates his work with the Wirral Poetry Festival team.

He enjoys performing poetry on Merseyside and beyond, relishes a broad range of poetry and art commissions and delivers workshops for organisations including The National Literacy Trust, Barnardo’s, The Reading Agency and Virtual School Liverpool.  He will host ‘The Last Night of the Poets’ at the 2024 Cheltenham Poetry Festival, deliver a poetry workshop at the 2024 Wychwood Festival and perform at the Shakespeare North Playhouse ‘Scratch’ event later this year.