PS Cottier

I just had to write about last Friday, which saw a flurry of poetic activity at The Front, a café/bar/gallery/performance space in Lyneham. The regular poetry slam held there, organised by Josh (JC) Inman and Varisht Gosain also saw the launch of the fourth edition of Canberra journal Burley. Patrick Mullins and Cara Foster edit that journal, although I understand that the editorial team is being enlarged for the next issue. Lots of wonderful poets performed in the slam, which was expertly judged…(Why, yes, I helped with that. Chris was the winner.)

But most interestingly for this little rhymester, there were two guest poets: Jackson from Western Australia, who radiates energy and plays the guitar, and Jennifer Compton. Fellow Tuesday Poet JC. Here we are before the slam started, and you can see Burley-related activity going on in the gallery space behind us:

Berets aplenty!

(Thank you to the pretty young man who took the photo! If you have a name, I have forgotten it, unfortunately.) It is the first time I have met Jennifer, who has been performing right down the east coast; notably at the Queensland Poetry Festival. She was tired, but her poetry was far from tiring: she does a very nice job in wicked and quietly disturbing.

This was a night that showed all that is good about Canberra; even the weather is pulling itself up by its bootstraps. I am, however, referring to the energy of the poetry, in both written and spoken form. All happening within a very short walking distance of my house.

Wonderful stuff, with a real mix of types of poetry and ages of poets. Sometimes I really love Canberra. Not the politicians’ Canberra, but the place where people live.

Click this feather and go to New Zealand for good poets who published actual poetry today: