Tuesday poem: Freckles
May 26, 2019
Another poem via link, this time to New Zealand speculative publication Sponge. ‘Freckles’ is a prose poem meditation on those weird little skin-flecks that many of us have. You can listen to me read the poem, too, if you like.
Tuesday poem: Monstrous poetry
May 5, 2019
If you click this link, you’ll find my snappily named poem ‘The creature runs through the Arctic ice, pursued by Doctor Frankenstein’, just published at Cordite. The issue has the name ‘Monster’ and was edited by Nathan Curnow. I’ve been sitting on that monster of a poem for ages, so it’s nice to see it out and about.
There are some wondrous monstrous things lurking there, so do have a read. If you dare. (I always wanted to write that sentence.)
Tuesday poem: The Ashes, 3150 A.D, and Les Murray
April 29, 2019
This one is via link to Eye To The Telescope, an online journal of speculative poetry run by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Poetry Association, based in the United States. The issue on ‘Sports and Games’ was edited by Lisa Timpf, who I believe is Canadian, so I’m extra pleased to have a poem about cricket published there. My poem is second in the issue, but have a look at all the poetry!
I have just heard that the poet Les Murray has died, and I am rereading some of his best work, such as The Cows on Killing Day. I remember talking to him about this poem, and whether he had thought of becoming vegetarian, and he said that that would mean a lot fewer cows in existence!
In person I found him to be an affable and funny man, and on the day of his death that is a good way to remember him. There will be a lot of proper obituaries appearing tomorrow.
Cheers, Les.
Tuesday poem: haiku
April 16, 2019
Autumn wind
white leaves swirling
cockatoos
In Canberra at the moment there are thousands of sulphur crested cockatoos and corellas, supplemented with galahs and gang-gang cockatoos. Some of these birds come down from the higher mountains to avoid the even worse cold, and some stay here all year round.
This morning I was having a coffee outside a café watching a cockatoo eat seedpods in a tree, making the leaves fall down, as many other birds flew overhead. Blame him/her for this little poem.
Tuesday poem: Two stroke (or more)
April 8, 2019
This one is via link to Not Very Quiet, an on-line journal of women’s poetry. The guest editor for this edition on the topic ‘Performing gender’ was KA Nelson, and the editors who run the whole thing are Moya Pacey and Sandra Renew, with the production being managed by Tikka Wilson.
There’s lots of good stuff to be found there! Here’s a slightly terrifying image to get you in the mood.
