The 40th edition of Magma is guest edited by Bloodaxe poet Roddy Lumsden. Contributors were asked to send poems on the themes of Passions and Obsessions, and so the issue is packed with passionate poems about beaches, colours, love affairs and record collections. Poets who feature include Matthew Caley, Greta Stoddart, AB Jackson, Siobhan Campbell, Martina Evans and Sally Read.

Noticing the high quality of work coming in from younger poets, Lumsden decided to make this a focus of the issue, selecting work by a dozen or so poets in their teens and early twenties, while six brilliant poets under 21 interview each other on the pleasures and perils of being a young poet. Another article looks wryly at what happens when poets live together, while Faber poet Nick Laird is inspired to write a new poem after attending a conference on fellow Belfast poet Louis MacNeice.