Welcome to Tellus

a magazine for poetry which sparks ancient worlds into life!

Tellus provides a shared space for new poems which engage contemporary minds by engaging with ancient civilisations, be that with their mythical imagination, political propaganda, cosmology, architecture, social stereotypes, literary works, cultural obsessions or jokes.

Tellus is the Roman Earth goddess, a fitting patroness for poems which are rooted in the grit of contemporary existence and experience, but whose immediacy is dependent on an insistent return to our cultural ancestors, to the vitality and intensity of ancient worlds. These poems do not speak to you in dead language from within academic cloisters, but entice you with fresh created worlds, with ancient worlds written new.

After a successful first issue, Tellus is looking forward to its second annual publication in March 2011.

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ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE - JOINT POETRY COMPETITION! Under 18s.

The story of the doomed love between Orpheus and Eurydice is one of the most well-known and well-loved of all the Classical myths; conveyed to us from antiquity through the poetry of Virgil and Ovid, for centuries writers and artists have been inspired by its moving tale. Perhaps it's Orpheus mesmerisng the underworld with his spellbinding song that moves you, or the moment Eurydice slips irrevocably back into the underworld for the last time. Whatever aspect inspires you, Iris magazine and Tellus magazine invite you to pen a poem (maximum 30 lines) and send it to Iris at editor@irismagazine.org by 12th December.

Ailsa at Tellus and Lorna at Iris will be joined by acclaimed poet Maureen Almond in judging the entries, and two runners up and a winner will be chosen. The runners up will be published in the January edition of Iris magazine, and the winning entry will be printed in the 2011 edition of Tellus magazine, a poetry magazine for writing inspired by the Classical world.

Good luck!