May Digital Poet-in-Residence: Maia Brown

As a continuation of our ‘Apart Together’ digital project, The Poetry Business has partnered up with Hive South Yorkshire to host three digital residencies in May, June and July. Each poet will be producing and posting digital content for The Poetry Business, such as blog posts, audio recordings, writing prompts and more.

Our Digital Poet-In-Residence for May is Maia Brown.


About Maia

Maia Brown is an alumnus of Doncaster Young Writers and a member of the Writing Squad and Hive Poetry. As well as being a poet, Maia is a visual artist and student of Archaeology, Anthropology and Art History. Their work has been published in journals including Matter and Push magazine, and the Hive anthologies Halfway Smile and Surfing the Twilight. Maia has been commissioned to write poems for various projects including Ripples of Hope Festival for human rights in 2021, and the Birdlife podcast in 2019. They’ve delivered gallery talks, judged children’s poetry competitions, run creative writing workshops for young people and read their work at various events including Sheaf Poetry Festival.


During my residency, I plan to explore what poetry does, and the different ways it is used to create connection. I’ll conduct mini-interviews with writers, facilitators and people who might not consider themselves poets. I will attend and reflect upon writing workshops, look at the works of other poets, and write blog posts exploring ideas around what poetry is for – loosely following the line of inquiry of the question, ‘what is the point in poetry?’


About Hive

Hive Young Writers’ Network is a writer development project for young writers (aged 14 to 30). Through writing groups, writers’ days with professional writers, partnership projects, mentorship, competitions, publications and live events, Hive support young writers to develop – whatever their background, experience or interest. 

South Yorkshire has an abundance of talented young poets, many of whom are part of the Hive Young Writers network and members of Hive groups in Sheffield, Barnsley, Doncaster & Rotherham. Among them are prize winners of accolades such as Foyle Young Poet of the Year, the Young Northern Writers Award and the New Poets Prize.

For more information: www.hivesouthyorkshire.com