Peter Ualrig Kennedy came to Essex from Edinburgh in 1971 to take up a post as a consultant physician in Colchester. He has always been interested in poetry and in writing all sorts of stuff; his first published poem – other than student ephemera – was Armageddon in Time and Tide in 1958.
 
After he retired from his hospital work in 1997, poetry became ever more important, and in 2007 he was a founder member of the poetry organisation Poetrywivenhoe. He is now its lead organiser, hosting occasional live readings and regular Zoom events with invited guests. He has established the Poetrywivenhoe website on which he publishes new poetry on a daily basis – submissions come from all quarters of the UK. He is a member of the Editorial Team of the quarterly publication Wivenhoe News, for which he writes a poetry page as well as other contributions to its content.
 
Currently he is a member of the Editorial Team for the projected ‘History of 250 Years of Health Care Provision in Colchester’, to be published by the Colchester Medical Society. And he is working on a potential three-generations collection of family poems, title not yet decided.
 
He has edited and published several anthologies, including those listed below, and his debut collection, Songs for a Daughter, was published by VOLE Books, Dempsey and Windle in 2021 (ISBN 978-1-913-32946-4).
 
Anthologies, as editor, Peter Kennedy:
 
Days begin …, Wivenbooks, 2015, ISBN 978-0-9929125-1-2 – A collection of poems about all manner of things, from suffragettes to fishmongers, from desert winds to Picasso women, from the Bakerloo Line to Runcorn Bridge … by some of our finest poets, all of whom have been guests at Poetrywivenhoe. The poems were all donated by their writers, in support of the Cancer Centre Campaign at Colchester Hospital.
 
The Tales Told by Birds: Poems in Lockdown, Volume One, Watermelon Press, 2020, ISBN 978-0-9934779-9-7 … A collection of 50 poems in chronological order from the Poetrywivenhoe website.
 
Caged Blossoms: More Poems in Lockdown, Volume Two, Watermelon Press, 2021, ISBN 978-1-8384154-1-9 … A collection of 50 more poems in chronological order from the Poetrywivenhoe website.
 
The Last Hotel: Even More Poems in Lockdown, Volume Three, Watermelon Press, 2021, ISBN 978-1-8384154-5-7 … A collection of 50 more poems in chronological order from the Poetrywivenhoe website.
 
Different Days, Different Desires: More Poems in Lockdown, Volume Four, Watermelon Press, 2023, ISBN 978-1-8384154-6-4 … A collection of 50 more poems in chronological order from the Poetrywivenhoe website.
 
Extracts from review comments:
 
on Days Begin … –
 

A fine collection by any standards.

Chrys Salt MBE

 
 
on Songs for a Daughter –

These poems speak their simple truths direct from the heart and are all the more touching for that.

Chrys Salt MBE

A rare collection that delivers on the promise of it title in singing its plaintive, yet clear-throated, song for a daughter.

Martin Malone

A life-affirming book … Enjoy the music.

Tim Cunningham

In this candid and moving collection Peter Kennedy shows us that … poetry can be an act of solidarity.

Stephen Boyce