“A WORD-based organism from Devon”, AKA poet Matt Harvey, will tackle issues such as lonely hearts, teabags and curtains at The Space on Saturday.

He'll be joined by Jo Bell, a boat-dwelling poet from Cheshire, Peter Wyton - 'the Seamus Heaney of Slam', and musician Oogoo Maia at Hoo-Hah Poetry's Cadence Cabaret.

“It’s a welcome return to Stroud for Matt Harvey, who was first here in 1997 supporting John Cooper Clarke in The Pelican for the Fringe Festival, right at the start of his career,” said organiser Adam Horovitz.

Matt performs up and down the country at festivals, cabarets, conferences and colleges. He is host of the Wondermentalist Cabaret in Totnes and a regular contributor both to BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Live and the Guardian’s Work section.

He told me: "I didn’t write poetry at school, but I do remember writing an essay and being told to copy it up for the school magazine. I’d never had that sort of success before.

"I used to write cheeky and scurrilous things on my rough books and they would get passed around the class. I realised then that there was a certain strange glee from writing stuff that people liked.

"I really like the instant response you get from live work. I try to keep it creative, going from poem to poem, with adlibbing in between. I feel safe enough to think on my feet because if you have enough prepared stuff, it acts like scaffolding. And I’m a primate swinging on that scaffolding," he said.

Cadence Cabaret starts at 8pm (doors open 7.30pm). Tickets cost £6 or £4 concessions in advance, from Kane’s Records, or from info@hoohahpoetry.com, or on the door.

Hoo-Hah Poetry is supported by Stroud Town Council. This event has also been funded by the Stroud Arts Festival.