Poems
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Mother
By Kirli SaundersMother,
I’ve spent hours now
searching for myself
in the symmetry of your skin -
Summertime
By Amanda AnastasiThe bush has ceased its muttering, as the air tightens
like a string. The birds have flown. The koalas are higher
in the trees, hugging the trunks. The roos are heading
for the river. You are filling a hatchback with what they -
Flight Calls
By Bastian Fox PhelanIn swampy woodland, between two stands of trees
On Awabakal land, I wait, listening
The trees are alive with sound
Surround-sound chiming of the bell miner / kowoman -
I don’t need to tell you that rain is poetry (the earth is an open mouth)
By Pascalle Burton'X marks the spot—the whole thing’s an X.'
from The Ignoramus of Love by Destroyer
this morning, I stepped outside
it had rained overnight -
Smothered
By Mahalia CharlotteThe women in our family hold our trauma in our spines.
Backs bodies breaking under burdens; matrilineal line of
heightened hysterical hyper-aroused harpies.
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A Manifesto (Written) in Salt
By Noelia RamónNot proclamations, not carved marble promises,
not headlines, not smoke rehearsing its pose.
But the hand of wind rearranging clouds,
the alphabet of rain sketching itself away -
english shackles his tongue
By Nathan Mudyi Sentanceit is a box with a few holes to let air in
he smiles
tightly coiled
knowing the air -
The Arbour
By Giles WatsonLook up through the slant of Sun -
the lit side of the Leaf
whose Weight gives Curve - to Branches -
which is the Arc - of Life - -
Reed and oak
By Cate KennedyI asked my child beneath a tree:
which one would you rather be,
a small slim reed or a strong oak tree?
Would you be the tree if the wind blows -
Suicide Pyjamas
By Aishah AliThe loudest harpoon in the phantom orchestra of my thoughts that night was the horrifying realisation that I opted
for the least flattering (ugliest) pyjamas when the paramedics rolled in like a typhoon into my childhood bedroom (after the first time) I tried do
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Instead of ADHD
By Lamisse Hamoudaafter Andrea Gibson's 'Instead of Depression'
Try calling it an adventure.
Imagine every unfinished project -
I want no truck with death
By Tim LovedayAfter Pablo Neruda’s ‘Keeping Quiet’
They used to be morning poems > as in to return to the house with all the pungent fate & fear of youth only to discover that the cellar door is caved in > not with axe but lyric > in the not quite driveway my father’s hand grips the back of my neck & I confuse the axe > what then are we to ma… -
green thumbs
By Lucy Nortonwhen i was young, i wished to
create somewhere so beautiful
where pain and terror
couldn’t find me. -
Hades
By Rebecca MoranWhen the river burst its banks
I was busy at work.
I had meetings. Plans. I wasn’t ready.
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Sansomnia
By Kendrea RhodesNocturnal rhythms tick and hum through the house,
you slip across the floorboards
leaving entrails in your wake
for others to retrace come dawn. -
No Man's Land
By ZaftyContent note: This poem contains strong language used in service of the poet’s voice and vision.
See…I’ve been a poet since like…year four?
…Yeahh I remember, I started stringing syllables like lifelines.
Learnt to link my language tighter -
Dragon Fruit
By Xiaole ZhanWe didn’t see the dragon fruit lights
arriving late as we did, thinking of
Popo and Gong Gong’s graves
which we would visit the next day. If only -
Richmond
By Nam LeSurely now, that sense of crow’s nest sway will ease
now we are brought down
first me, then my brother — my mum now —
and our memories -
Born to Fight
By Kaitlen WellingtonBlak curly hair
Brown skin
Brown eyes
Broad shoulders -
There are Rivers Underneath the Sea
By Dženana VucicEverything begins like this: with a shipwreck;
one body rent against another,
salt and silt,
waves lapping at the crest of another world.
