The Jawbone Journal

Editorial from Issue 2 - Winter 2025

Introduction/Editorial

It gives me a great deal of pleasure to write this introduction for the second issue of The Jawbone Journal. Thank you to everyone who has bought a copy or a subscription, and to every one of you that has trusted us with your words.

This second issue has an international flavour; we now have submissions from around the world, and one of our sections addresses issues relating to Gaza and the Freedom Flotilla.

As someone who was diagnosed as autistic nearly 25 years ago. I am very aware that I am often masking my thoughts and my words to fit in, to avoid upsetting anyone with my directness. My poetry frequently speaks for me, often in the guise of satire, sometimes directly, about my views on oligarchs, class, society, politics and the state of the world. The opinions expressed here are my own, as are the words and thoughts in my poetry.

The Jawbone Collective CIC offers a platform for marginalised and seldom heard voices through publication and live performance spaces. These voices and platforms are vital for a fair and equitable civilisation. While there may be those who don’t agree, it is important to have open discourse and dialogue.

As writers we all have opinions, observations and perspectives that may not conform with the views of our governments, and this may be expressed through poetry and prose. Early on in our submission window, we noticed a trend amongst the submissions addressing issues in Gaza. The interception of The Freedom Flotilla persuaded us to invite people to tackle this subject.

So, this is not a ‘safe’ issue. We are tackling some very big subjects, there is a CONTENT WARNING - WAR, GRAPHIC SCENES, DEATH, TRUTH, POLITICS.  There is also content that relates to Bereavement, Covid, Monsters, Winged Horses, Surrealism, Menopause, Feathers, Regional Dialects and so much more!

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request submitted by Equity revealed that the Arts Council England’s (ACE) warning, that ‘political statements’ could break funding agreements, was formulated in relation to the Israel-Gaza conflict. Since this Journal is entirely supported by our subscribers and by our generous supporters we are not going to lose our funding. But this made us question… Would publication of poetry and prose centred on political issues affect our chances of future funding and is this in fact creative censorship?

So whilst the individual writers are responsible for the words in their pieces, as the Producer and Editor, I have tried to present a balanced and well curated Journal for our readers. We hope that you enjoy reading this latest issue and that you will agree that these are ‘words to keep you talking’.

Peter Roe 

founder and co-editor

November 2025

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