Tuesday poem: On the couch
March 4, 2019
This poem was published last weekend in The Canberra Times, one of the few newspapers to still have a regular ‘corner’ for poetry. You can see ‘corner’ in terms of a place to hide, or the place where boxers go between rounds. I prefer the latter idea!
The poetry section is edited by the indefatigable Lizz Murphy, who also has a blog.
UPDATE: The Canberra Times will soon be open for submissions of poetry. The editor is particularly interested in work by Indigenous poets. Here are some details.
Tuesday Poem: Perfect words
August 29, 2016
Perfect words
Sometimes they reach out
caress with syllable fingers —
egregious is my long term love
half egret feathers with the jus
noise saucing the end,
despite the meaning
or because it’s such a better way
to say doubleplusbad.
Gnarly enchants, with that
drowning g, wiping out
in the endless surf of the ee.
What wetsuit could protect,
what board shorts deserve
the sweet yet egregious sea,
with the tincture of shark grin
and the promise of release?
P.S. Cottier
That illustration is most egregiously gnarly, and not AMA approved.
***
Here’s a photo in a different key, of Susan Hawthorne and Lizz Murphy who were participants in a discussion on The Poetics of Politics which was part of The Canberra Writers Festival. I moderated the session on Saturday, and it went well, I think. We covered quite a lot of ground, and read several poems. Later I thought about the event, and I realised that all the speakers and questioners had been women, which was a first, in my experience, at a mixed gender event.
Here are Lizz and Susan at Tilley’s après the panel. They both ate. I drank, and had a quiet evening watching horrendous Swedish murders being solved Nordically.
And here’s another one before the wine at the end of the event itself; thank you Gina Dow.
Too busy Toosday
August 22, 2016
I apologise profusely for no original poem today. I am a tad busy at the moment.
Thursday 25th at 7.30, I am reading poetry at Manning Clark House, Tasmania Circle, Griffith. Many of the poems will have first been published on this very blog, or at Project 365 + 1. I will be reading for about 30 minutes, as will Hazel Hall, the other reader. There is an entry fee of $10, I think, which covers wine, some small items of food and the wee literary stuff.
On 27th August (Saturday) I’ll be moderating a discussion on The Poetics of Politics, at the National Library of Australia (a big building by the lake). The immoderators/speakers are Lizz Murphy and Susan Hawthorne, and it happens at 12pm, just after a launch of novelist Kaaron Warren’s new book, The Grief Hole, at the very same library at 11am.
On the 31st August I’ll be going to the launch of Award Winning Australian Writing in Melbourne, and reading a poem, and then attending the announcement of the Australian Catholic University Poetry Competition results the next day. I am short-listed for that, but I don’t think I won a prize this year, for various reasons. Still, they produce a really nice collection of poems short-listed in the competition.
Then I will hopefully get some writing done. Plus I’ll soon be proofreading a new chapbook of poems. More about that later.
Lizz Murphy at the Hub
July 28, 2014
That sounds like an ad for a jazz singer, at a club drenched in twilight like cheap cologne, where the sax wails like a lonely cat.
But it is not. It is purely informative, telling you, dear reader, that I edited the hub post for Tuesday Poem this week, and that it features the said Ms Murphy with a most beguiling poem. Press this feather and read:
Here is a photo of Lizz Murphy and myself in front of some wool, which bears absolutely no relation to the poem. She is the one who looks intelligent.
So who is in it?
May 22, 2014
I thought people might be interested to know who is in The Stars Like Sand: Australian Speculative Poetry. So here is the full list:
David Adès, Zoë Anderson, Jude Aquilina, Emilie Zoey Baker, Catherine Bateson, Eric Beach, Judith Beveridge, Jenny Blackford, Peter Boyle, John Le Gay Brereton, Sara Bruxner, joanne burns, Michael Byrne, Caroline Caddy, me, Mike Crowl, Victor J. Daley, Luke Davies, C.J. Dennis, Jake Dennis, Benjamin Dodds, Joe Dolce, Michael Dransfield, Diane Fahey, Mary Hannay Foott, Carolyn Gerrish, Kevin Gillam, Alan Gould, John Grey, Lesbian Harford, Dimitra Harvey, Ron Heard, Eliza-Jane Henry-Jones, Matt Hetherington, Paul Hetherington, Dorothy Hewett, Marilyn Humbert, Lisa Jacobson, John Jenkins, Jill Jones, Raphael Kabo, Melinda Kallasmae, S.K. Kelen, Earl Livings, Chris Lynch, Emily Manger, Catherine Martin, M.F. McAuliffe, Victoria McGrath, Jo Mills, Peter Minter, Lizz Murphy, Les Murray, Jan Napier, John Shaw Neilson, Barry O’Donahue, Jan Owen, Moya Pacey, Andrew Barton Paterson, Simon Petrie, Dorothy Porter, Craig Powell, David P. Reiter, Philip Salom, Janeen Samuel, Miro Sandev, Tim Sinclair, Alex Skovron, Melinda Smith, J. Brunton Stephens, Alan Stewart, John Tranter, John Upton, Rod Usher, Susan Waddell, Rob Walker, Chris Wallace-Crabbe, Samuel Wagan Watson, Mercedes Webb-Pullman, Les Wicks, Sean Williams, SB Wright.
Rapt, I am, to unwrap such a group. Lovely pagefellows to lie between such covers:
I am really looking forward to the launches now. I’ll post the invitation posters again soon, just in case the list has inspired you to come along and hear some of that group read at either of the launches. (I copied the list by hand and eye, just to refamiliarise myself, so please excuse any typos, which are not in the book!)
PS Cottier 