Fun, Frolicking, Friendship, Fascination and Flying: submission update from the Dirigible Balloon
Hello Balloonists!
My best ideas often arrive from two different situations. The first is when I’m outside running/jogging/shuffling (never ever on a treadmill). The combination of oxygen-rich blood coursing through arteries, the brain flooding the body with endorphins and endocannabinoids oozing across cell membranes to the rhythmic beat of feet over Cumbrian landscapes (or school sports days) is a sure-fire way of being inspired. The second way is when I’m clinging to a ladder, thirty feet off the floor, painting the outside of a house on a hot and sunny June afternoon (something to do with adrenaline, the hardness of concrete and a sense of one’s mortality).
![]()
I know this to be a fact, for it was a combination of these situations (consecutively, not simultaneously) in the summer of 2021 which led to the idea of developing a website (devoid of intrusive pop-up advertisements and freely available to families and schools) where the best poetry written for children by aspiring and largely unknown poets could be found.
The Dirigible Balloon came from a desire to increase the number of outlets available for poets who write for children. I wanted to improve the visibility of these poets at the beginning of their writing careers, to showcase their work on a platform alongside established and more famous writers.
Richard Trinder from The Yorkshire Times offered to author the website through his p.ublished group of online newspapers and in August 2021, 30 poems from 12 poets in the UK took off on our inaugural flight. Five years later, we have well over 2000 poems from 500+ poets worldwide and two printed anthologies under our collective belt (Chasing Clouds and Sky Surfing) which raised money for the National Literacy Agency in 2022 and Juvenile Arthritis Research in 2024.
Now in the second half of 2026, we’re underway with organising and editing our third anthology. We’ve gone through three working titles for this latest poetry collection and it’s a case of ‘watch this space’ for the final version. We have decided to support the charity ‘Keep Me Breathing’ Registered Charity Number 1201757 (developing awareness of Congenital Central Hypoventilation Syndrome) and when we eventually get our project to the printing stage, all the money generated through sales will be donated to that excellent organisation.
In the meantime, I’ve been wondering how we might mark the approaching birthday of The Balloon …
As it’s our 5th anniversary, to celebrate this milestone, the theme for the autumn upload of freshly written poems for children on the DB will be “Fun, Frolicking, Friendship, Fascination and Flying” (there’s a broad remit to be sure, JH) .
The submission window will open in the first two weeks of August and the poems chosen for the anniversary flight will be uploaded on a rolling basis as we approach September.
For poets who haven’t submitted work for consideration before, our guidelines are available on the website on the ‘ABOUT’ page. Please read them carefully!
Cheers, good luck with the poems and thanks for the continuing support.
Jonathan : )
My best ideas often arrive from two different situations. The first is when I’m outside running/jogging/shuffling (never ever on a treadmill). The combination of oxygen-rich blood coursing through arteries, the brain flooding the body with endorphins and endocannabinoids oozing across cell membranes to the rhythmic beat of feet over Cumbrian landscapes (or school sports days) is a sure-fire way of being inspired. The second way is when I’m clinging to a ladder, thirty feet off the floor, painting the outside of a house on a hot and sunny June afternoon (something to do with adrenaline, the hardness of concrete and a sense of one’s mortality).
The Dirigible Balloon came from a desire to increase the number of outlets available for poets who write for children. I wanted to improve the visibility of these poets at the beginning of their writing careers, to showcase their work on a platform alongside established and more famous writers.
Richard Trinder from The Yorkshire Times offered to author the website through his p.ublished group of online newspapers and in August 2021, 30 poems from 12 poets in the UK took off on our inaugural flight. Five years later, we have well over 2000 poems from 500+ poets worldwide and two printed anthologies under our collective belt (Chasing Clouds and Sky Surfing) which raised money for the National Literacy Agency in 2022 and Juvenile Arthritis Research in 2024.
Now in the second half of 2026, we’re underway with organising and editing our third anthology. We’ve gone through three working titles for this latest poetry collection and it’s a case of ‘watch this space’ for the final version. We have decided to support the charity ‘Keep Me Breathing’ Registered Charity Number 1201757 (developing awareness of Congenital Central Hypoventilation Syndrome) and when we eventually get our project to the printing stage, all the money generated through sales will be donated to that excellent organisation.
In the meantime, I’ve been wondering how we might mark the approaching birthday of The Balloon …
As it’s our 5th anniversary, to celebrate this milestone, the theme for the autumn upload of freshly written poems for children on the DB will be “Fun, Frolicking, Friendship, Fascination and Flying” (there’s a broad remit to be sure, JH) .
The submission window will open in the first two weeks of August and the poems chosen for the anniversary flight will be uploaded on a rolling basis as we approach September.
For poets who haven’t submitted work for consideration before, our guidelines are available on the website on the ‘ABOUT’ page. Please read them carefully!
Cheers, good luck with the poems and thanks for the continuing support.
Jonathan : )
This poem is copyright (©) Jonathan Humble 2026
About the Writer
Jonathan Humble
Jonathan lives in Cumbria. His work has been published online and in print in a number of magazines and anthologies. His first collection of poetry, My Camel's Name Is Brian, was published by TMB Books in 2015. His second poetry book, Fledge came out in 2020 through Maytree Press. His poems for children have been shortlisted and highly commended in the Caterpillar and Yorkmix poetry competitions and he is the editor of The Dirigible Balloon. His poems Masterclass and This Work is Done were chosen as the Milk House Poem of the Year at the end of 2022 and 2023.
