Peace, tolerance and understanding
August 28, 2015
…and a very quiet dress bought, appropriately, at a church fete.
Just got back from Melbourne where I was awarded third prize in the Australian Catholic University’s Poetry Prize, on the topic ‘Peace, Tolerance and Understanding’. I wrote an angry, occasionally funny poem on the topic, called ‘Route 9’, which I may post at a later date. I tried to embody the way we judge people by appearances in a narrative poem, so my raving on about clothes is almost relevant. I just saw an article in City News about the awards:
(The City is question in Canberra, not Melbourne.)
First prize was awarded to Kristen Lang, and second prize to Josephine Wilson. The judge was Kevin Hart. A lovely book of the poems was produced by the university, with a cover designed by Chandler Brooks-Smith. I think that producing such a book is a great initiative, as it allows a full exploration of the topic. It is humbling to see how good many of the short-listed poets works are; I particularly like ‘Little Pup’ by Heather Taylor Johnson.
Thank you to Moya Pacey, who took the photo, and who has a very strong and intelligent poem in the book.
Prize winners were asked to read our poems right at the end of proceedings. Because of the Copious Free Wine, my brain resembled my dress by that stage…but I managed.
I will put my $1000 towards a new computer, so I can produce more angry and funny poetry about social justice, politics and perceptions. And read them out wearing really quiet dresses.
Speaking of which (I segue like a devil on speed) I am reading at The Gods on September 8, along with Owen Bullock and Melinda Smith. Hopefully the Anglican Church where I scored that dress will be having an early fete this year. But in the meantime, I’m out to ride my bike in the fresh Canberra air, wearing shabby, comfortable jeans.
Tuesday poem: The ones wearing suits
August 17, 2015
The ones wearing suits
are the only ones with polished shoes catching wedged glimpses of the blue eye sky. Their ties are well knotted and the women’s hair constrained like ostrich eggs on their heads. We slouch by, wearing jeans, wearing ironic slogans like brands. We are comfortable enough to slob; comfortable enough to break traffic laws. We sip our coffees and flick through sullen mags; our thumbs fidget only on phones. We complain if we wait too long, and swear at meters mouthing our change like madeleines.
The ones wearing suits wait for the piece of paper from the ones behind that other counter (yes, those other ones sometimes wear suits, but beige and grudgingly). Ah that I could unknot those papers! I say nobly to myself, as I sip my expresso, and watch those queuing, watch those forming a border around the Department of Immigration and Border Protection. Framing my coffee with their neat ties of anxiety, their perfect, uneasily bunched hair.
P.S. Cottier
That prose poem was first published in Awkword Paper Cut (US) last year as part of an essay I wrote about writing, the Australian flag, nationalism and immigration, called ‘Mild flapping’.
I remembered it yesterday, as I was flipping through a Real Paper Paper, and came across an advertisement for a senior position at the Department of Immigration and Border Protection. It is obviously in the HR area, but the title given to the position is ‘Head of People Division’. I read that as the person responsible for drawing a line between those of us lucky enough to be in Australia, and those trying to make it here. People Division with the Border as the vinculum. Call me silly!
The poem above describes Lonsdale Street in Braddon, Canberra, where people on visas of various sorts in Australia go to a branch of the Department, often, it seems, trying to have their stay extended or made permanent. A couple of doors up is one of my favourite cafés, where those of us with citizenship sip our drinks and write poems.
And of course, there are the people we can’t see, locked up elsewhere.
***
I used to do a bit of book reviewing in The Canberra Times. Indeed, I once won $200 of wine in the ACT Writers Centre Awards for a book review, which was damned useful. My reviewing seems to be taking off again. Here is a link to a review of a book about ageing by Rudi Westendorp which was published recently. (Sydney Morning Herald site.)
Read the works of the other Tuesday Poets around the world by pressing here.
We are all working our way up, towards the birds
We are all working our way up, towards the birds.
Outliers like Icarus, 70s pterodactyl hanggliders,
twitchers and breeders of weird coloured parrots:
they have all felt the urge and responded
to the best of their beakless capacities.
But they are not the neo-orno avant-garde.
The egg must come first, before the flight —
putting aside philosophy, that is just true.
So who is nature’s true Anna Wintour?
Where is the next Paris to be found?
The catwalk of the world is spiked by echidna.
Platypus pouts there too. (That is hard with a bill.)
These two are the fashion-forward models,
who will soon sprout wings and launch and fly;
it is happening now, as I type and you read.
Placenta will be ditched, like yesterday’s rags.
Next year, unaided flight will be de rigueur,
and song will erupt, without instruments,
deep from the gape of seven billion throats.
We are all working our way up, towards the birds.
P.S. Cottier
This poem was recently highly commended in the Interstellar Award for Speculative Poetry. Fellow Tuesday Poet (and lovely person/editor) Tim Jones was placed second with a poem that blends the speculative and the political, and Kevin Gillam (who may be lovely, for all I know, but who lives in Western Australia, which is much further away than New Zealand, at least psychologically) was awarded first place with a fascinating work that demands several readings. (A little like that monstrous sub-clausey sentence, but much much better.) You can read their poems and the detailed judge’s report here. This was the second thing I was highly commended/shortlisted/close-but-no-cigared for in the last fortnight! I won’t bore on about the other one though, as I don’t want to publish that poetry here just yet.
If you like humorous, short poetry, I promise that some will be read at Manning Clark House on 24th June at 7.30pm. I hear there will also be some quite angry stuff, and, of course, some speculative poetry. That’s by me; I have no idea if Mark Tredinnick writes any of that sort of thing. (He is the other reader.)
Come along to 11 Tasmania Circle and find out. Also; wine.
Read the works of the other Tuesday Poets around the world by pressing here.
Happy birthday Banjo!
February 18, 2015
For yesterday, that is.
I just drove back from Orange, about three and a half hours from Canberra. Andrew Barton ‘Banjo’ Paterson was born here, and the 17th February is his birthday. I went courtesy of a competition offered through Australian Poetry Ltd and attended a poetry competition, a birthday breakfast, a dinner, and undertook my own Banjo-related activities.
Soon I’ll write something about the Banjo Paterson Australian Poetry Festival for Australian Poetry’s website. (There are too many similar words in that sentence, but that can’t be helped!) I’ll talk about how much I enjoyed this experience in Orange, but for now I must rest, having eaten about as much as I eat in a week over three days. Here is a photo of a bust of the poet, erected just near his birthplace. It can be found in a park dedicated to him:
And what other Australian poet gets jokes made about his or her birthday by coffee shops? (Yes, that is rhetorical…)
Poems at Australian Poetry
January 22, 2015
Press this link for poems written during the on-line course ‘Write what you can’t know’ in which I tutored last year for Australian Poetry:
http://www.australianpoetry.org/news/our-speculative-poetry-on-line-course/
One by Merryn Juliette, one by Robyn Black and one by the tutor currently known as moi. Mine is about a very nasty poet elf.
This image pleases me; so here it is again.
PS Cottier 