Friendly Street Poets

#1 Category for all work published on this site

FSP March City Meeting & Open Mic

Friday 6th March 2026
doors at 6:00pm for 6:30pm start

The Box Factory
59 Regent St, Adelaide, SA 5000

$5 to read, free to listen.

It’s Adelaide Festival and Fringe time and the poetry continues at FSP!

As usual, a strict 3-minute time limit applies, including any introductions, explanations and post-scripts. Bring two typed / printed copies of your poem with all your contact details on the back of the pages for submission to the next FSP Annual Anthology.

Membership fees for 2026 are now due: $25 for wage earners and $15 for others.
Click here for information about membership and forms.… Click for more

CHANGE OF VENUE for the launch of Chronicle – The First Fifty Years of Friendly Street – The Second Edition

Constellations at the Exchange

Monday, 2 March, 2026
1:00 – 2:00 pm

The Exchange
55 Exchange Pl, Adelaide SA, 5000

Please note the change of venue (originally scheduled for Adelaide Town Hall)

Chronicle – The First Fifty Years of Friendly Street – The Second Edition will be launched as part of the Constellations Festival at the Exchange Building (former Stock Exchange and home of RiAus).

Welcome a panel of Friendly Street poets, as they launch Chronicle, their vibrant history publication, and relate colourful stories from the hippie ’70s to present day, along with readings of some of the best poetry presented at the longest-running, un-censored open mic in Australia.… Click for more

FSP February City Meeting and Open Mic

Friday 6th February 2026
doors at 6:00pm for 6:30pm start

The Box Factory
59 Regent St, Adelaide, SA 5000

$5 to read, free to listen.

Our monthly poetry open mic meetings are returning for 2026!

As usual, strict 3-minute time limit, including any introductions, explanations and post-scripts. Bring two copies of your poem with all your contact details for submission to the next FSP Annual Anthology.

Membership fees for 2026 are now due: $25 for wage earners and $15 for others.
Click here for information about membership and forms.

Announcements will be made to inform everyone about FSP’s plans for the year.… Click for more

In case you missed it – or if you would like to see it again: The FSP 50th Anniversary Poetry Love In on video.

As part of the FSP 50th Anniversary celebrations, The Poetry Love In was held at the Box Factory on 7th November 2025. It was a big night with an all-star line up of FSP poets on the microphone. If you missed it, or of you were there and would like to re-live the experience, click on the link below to see a video of the night, thanks to Jude Aquilina.

click here to watch the video on YouTube

Jude is also putting together a video of the Anniversary Dinner so if you have photos from the night she could use, send them to her at: jude_poet[at]yahoo[dot]com[dot]au.… Click for more

Friendly Street Poets 50th Anniversary Dinner

Tuesday 11 November 2025
6:00 pm – 10:00 pm

Coopers Alehouse
316 Pulteney Street, Adelaide, SA 5000

$46 for 2-course meal
Click here to book at trybooking

Friendly Street Poets invite you to our 50th Anniversary Dinner!

Each ticket includes a two-course meal.
The bar will be staffed so you can buy your drinks throughout the event.

Doors open at 6pm for pre-dinner drinks and catch-up conversations.

We ask that people arrive to find a seat from 6pm. Some seats will be allocated for Special Guests and those with mobility issues, but everyone can choose to sit with friends. If you have mobility issues, please let us know and we will allocate your seating.… Click for more

Poem of the Month – July 2025 – Roger Higgins

The Poem of the Month for July 2025, selected by 2025 Anthology editors Val Braendler and Ben Adams, is Vital Statistics by Roger Higgins. The commended poems are autumn’s last day by David Cookson, Is It Love by Maeve Archibald and For the One I Have Become by Doris Nickolas.

Vital Statistics
(or Working in Winter in Kazakhstan)
Roger Higgins


Expect minus twenty-seven, feels like minus thirty-three,
I am decked out in thermals and multiple layers,
cheekbones feeling like thin glass
that would shatter at a touch.

And we are already below forecast
without counting the chill of a wind
piling snow to the rooflines of the few buildings
the window glass displaying in strata
the past week’s weather.… Click for more

+ More