JACKSON was born in Cumbria, England, and currently lives in New Zealand after many years in Australia. Jackson has written poetry since childhood and has published four books, a chapbook, seven zines and an audio album. They won the 2019 Ros Spencer Poetry Prize and the 2014 Ethel Webb Bundell Poetry Prize, and have also won a number of second prizes and commendations. Jackson’s hundreds of public appearances include guest performances at the Queensland and Tasmanian Poetry Festivals. In 2018, Jackson completed a PhD in Writing at Edith Cowan University, winning the University Research Medal, the Arts and Humanities Research Medal and the Magdalena Prize for Feminist Research.
Since 1991, Jackson’s work has been published in Australian, American, English and Canadian journals and anthologies, including the Australian Poetry Journal, The High Window, Ink Sweat & Tears, London Grip, Cordite, and the Fremantle Press Anthology of Western Australian Poetry. Jackson was the featured essayist in The High Window issue 7.
In 2009 Jackson instigated Perth Poetry Club, a highly successful weekly reading and community group, which is now well-known across the poetry world and has launched many poets’ public careers. They coordinated it until 2012, then founded the online poetry journal Uneven Floor, editing it from 2013 to 2018.
Jackson has two adult children and has worked as a computer programmer, a charity telemarketer, a voluntary breastfeeding counsellor, and an English-language teacher. They taught English in China in 2018/2019 and now work primarily as an editor.
3 September 2023