It was a cold summer that year. What I remember is the chill on my skin as you stripped me in fiendish haste, the raw southerly swelling and parting the curtains of the rented room. Now, when life begins to leave itself why is it this figment that clings? Such a light thing, and yet … Continue reading
I prefer (wish list for autistic primary schooler) serious illness to surprises computers to my brother reading number plates to Christmas morning straight lines submerging my ears in a warm bath to waterslides deep fat fryers to matchbox cars torture to haircuts libraries to birthday parties standing ankle-deep in ocean tenpin bowling to climbing … Continue reading
I am a sundial In a sunken garden. On the days when you show your face I bask, all those long warm hours. You only see me when I glow, borrowing your radiance – but behind me, where you cannot see, circles a cold shadow blade. It gets longer the closer you are to leaving … Continue reading
Melinda Smith won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for her fourth book of poems, Drag down to unlock or place an emergency call (Pitt St Poetry, 2013). Her work has been widely anthologised both inside and outside Australia and has been translated into Indonesian, Chinese, Burmese and Italian. She is based in the ACT and … Continue reading
The Detention Centre Christmas Island With closed eyes he looked at me silently gazing brazed lips whispers and sounds firmly locked in heavy feet sitting lightly on an empty seat. I crossed the blue waves crashed, pulled me down — I saw death a thousand times and time again, death looked me in the eye. … Continue reading
A Chinese Affair – Extract I dream of my mother again. She is sitting in front of the sewing machine, crying. I press on the wooden door and it opens quietly. My father tells me to come in. He is lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, where cobwebs dangle at the corners. He murmurs, … Continue reading
Matt Hetherington is a writer, music-maker, and moderate self-promoter living in Brisbane. He has been writing poetry for over 30 years, and has published 4 poetry collections and over 300 poems. His first all-haiku/senryu collection ‘For Instance’ was published in March 2015 by Mulla Mulla Press. He is also on the board of the Australian … Continue reading
In the park at Richmond River the ibis converge on the scraps like clumsy ballerinas. One bites the tail of a water dragon who stares at me astonished, like perhaps we knew each other in a past life. Across the way a row of Queenslanders lift their skirts to avoid puddles and cars drive by, … Continue reading
I woke up this morning afraid of the world then a man threw up at the bus stop. I stared the other way, he had tears in his eyes and so did I, but all I could remember was Bobby Brady saying (at 5.25 last night) that if it worked for a girl it might … Continue reading
Beth Spencer is the Poet of the Month for February, and this week she is offering Poem and Dish readers, an eBook copy of her book of poetry Vagabondage. To go in the draw, please follow Poem and Dish, like this post and leave a comment so I can contact you. You can specify in … Continue reading
Leaving is like breaking something not a single crash smash on the floor but a long drawn out rugged exhausting tearing asunder God is in the details as I pick them apart The fine bones The hush I remember that first time unbidden I heard it, as I was outside walking with my cup … Continue reading
On the station the aging Nazi skinhead is just another baldy now, he’s finished his last minute Xmas shopping. Poking out from his festive T-shirt those swastika tattoos on his neck have paled to a gunmetal grey. Torn cotton shorts on a multicoloured rail station, it seems like all his arguments have been fought to … Continue reading
Beth Spencer’s awards include The Age Short Story Award, runner up for the Steele Rudd Award (for How to Conceive of a Girl), the inaugural Dinny O’Hearn Fellowship, and assistance from the Literature Board of the Australia Council. Vagabondage, a verse memoir about the year she lived in a campervan (UWAPublishing, 2014) was her first … Continue reading
i. my darling, this night and your mouth soft ochre under the tallow that wakes us – where we taste salted-wine, sea-grass, and I pull the sea’s black reach from under your skin – sea witch, your squall of dark pearls undone, your hair a black furlong. And I give you sea-flowers, relics – a … Continue reading
My former self crouched composed by every element coming in through the broken screen blizzard froze my hair heaven electric pink through the two-in-the-morning window. Now I think loneliness is like lightning. It is attracted to its previous victims. Luckily solitude keeps me company. © Anne Walsh Continue reading
The day tries to be as beautiful as you How she mimics your eyes in the dawn How she dresses the wind in your soft T shirt How she laughs sideways at me when I don’t hear what she says How she paints her doves with the same colour wingtips How she escapes me © … Continue reading
Visible in the wild wreck I am is the empire I was My ruin is the most beautiful architecture Wreckage has made me dervish, an astonishing ravaged split log angel In the brown of my eyes pulled up, the Spanish doubloons of the autumn squash yellow of debris, the shock of stained glass intact after … Continue reading
Anne Walsh is a poet and a story writer whose work falls somewhere on the border of those two countries. Sometimes she’s a dual citizen and sometimes she has no country at all. Most of the time she is illegal everywhere; a local nowhere. Hers, the homeless criminality of only the deepest love. She was … Continue reading
For thou hast girded me with strength unto the battle Psalm 18 1 A hackled old mind crawls in its darkness, a story-telling crab cracking the shells of night-hours tries to stretch itself out of its thoughts like a person praying for sufficiency-in-God’s-eyes, so teasingly almost possible. All worlds must end, begin, end, the rap … Continue reading
In a dream there is a veil of water between us, your face green with algae: my mirror image, separate, waterlogged in a world you trail within you. The Aztec water goddess is you, who grew the hearts that were thrown to her into a prickly pear tree, each fruit unpickable, embroiled with the spines … Continue reading
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