Poems
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Mallee desert
By Luke SweedmanThe morning in the Great Sandy Desert
is an entirely new narrative of the senses
Thryptomene shrubs and mallee stands
a tonic, a memory, a gift that recompenses -
Macrocarpa
By Nandi ChinnaThe show takes place on the edge
of the car park. We sit in our cars,
engines cooling, as swirling red stamens
thrust off their woody caps. -
What is a tree?
By Luke SweedmanWhat is a tree but a throw away term
a northern hemisphere assumption
that we all grow straight and tall
and adopt a standard upward function -
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Things are not as they appear, nor are they otherwise
By Nandi ChinnaMeelup Mallee
Progeny nursed in its lumpen fist,
a giant inhabits the limestone ridge.
Shy in its limey cave of soil, -
Jarrah (buying the block)
By Renee Pettitt-SchippEucalyptus marginata
I am a shooter, the seller says
and neither of us meet his eye
earth, shade of a wound, up high -
Sorrow and Beauty in Equal Measure
By Nandi ChinnaMottlecah - Eucalyptus macrocarpa
In 1842 a macrocarpa was grown from a seed at Kew Gardens
It flowered five years later in 1847.
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karri
By Scott-Patrick Mitchellkarris will always remind me of you
how we drove through a canyon
of ancient wood, marvelled at how
sky bowed in boughs, us driving -
In Search of the Meelup Mallee
By Nandi ChinnaHeading south, windscreen wipers
frantic, breaking waves of runoff
beneath Mandjoogoordap Drive.
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Mallee love poem
By Luke SweedmanWe came to the mallee in spring
When dawn and dusk light shone
And the scent of the seasons
Blew warm in the soft spoken wind -
Karri (or, Slow Arrival in Karri Country)
By Renee Pettitt-SchippEucalyptus diversicolour
Denmark, WA
~ Written on Noongar Country with Noongar translations informed by Pibulmun Custodian, Wayne Webb.
Remote as a god -
In mind’s eye
By Luke SweedmanMallee in my mind’s eye is mostly a below ground affair
what we see above is only a part of the overall mystery
the multi stems above ground are part of the living heart
that sends a maze of roots below to unknown depths -
Old Grey Beard
By Daniel HansenSoft Grey Calm
Touches gently on the frequencies all around
Sorting through an assortment of vibrations apparent in the stars
Until it finds Love through the never ending shroud -
Exploration in mallee
By Luke Sweedman“A load on each spirit, a cloud o’er each soul
With eyes that could scan not, our destiny’s scroll”
~ Ernest Giles crossing the Great Victoria Desert
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Mallee
By Renee Pettitt-SchippEucalyptus myriandena
Narembeen
~ Written on Noongar Country with Noongar translations informed by Ballargong Custodian, David Collard. -
Gungurru - Silver Princess
By Nandi ChinnaEucalyptus caesia
A habit of weeping, now common
throughout the suburbs
loitering in groups of three, -
Marri (Remembering Meelup Regional Park)
By Scott-Patrick MitchellThe forest breathes us in. We are chasing bush orchids. Kambarrang is singing. Through a macro lens, petals bend, fill the screen. Blue; beard; duck. Your grin dazzles, blonde hair curling around my heart. We laugh. The forest smiles with us. Donkey; elbow; leek. Beyond the breadth of this, ocean swims. Here is the place of the moon rising. The fo… -
In the Mallee Garden, Kings Park
By Nandi ChinnaA global mix of accents and dialects
echo along the terraces,
rising and falling amongst the flowers.
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kangaroo paw
By Scott-Patrick Mitchellblood beats red, thumps in
elation, dread. how, as an
immigrant, my ears rang
with this land sang diaspora -
Sweedman’s Sprawling Mallee
By Nandi ChinnaEucalyptus Sweedmaniana
In every moment of human time
our skins open, porous to influence
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