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sixty-three (Actias luna)

The boat slowed and eased towards the shore. The torch that the captain was holding illuminated the truck on the shore and the waiting men, each of them holding a rifle. The soldiers were surrounded by enormous moths, with white wings, their wings flashing reflected light. A magical cloud, attracted to the … Continue reading

Author : nike

sixty-two (tongue. key)

I was born by the side of the road in a year nobody remembers. Meaning not that nobody remembers that year, but that nobody who was there when I was born recorded the fact of my birth, or recalls it, or is still alive. Except for my sister. I don’t … Continue reading

Author : nike

sixty-one (revolutionary etude, for the left hand)

There are an enormous number of general empirical propositions that count as certain for us. One such is that if someone’s arm is cut off it will not grow again (L Wittgenstein, On Certainty) There were nine of them to begin with. Children, that is. Ten, if you count poor Dora, dead … Continue reading

Author : nike

fifty-nine (the wind and his wife)

In the winter, the wind and his wife began to dwindle. They put a candle in the window, to light the path to their door. No one came near but the owls, who watched the old couple bend, and fetch, and fade. They were barely a whisper, barely a wisp. … Continue reading

Author : nike

fifty-eight (the girl in this poem)

The girl in this poem does not love you She’s just a girl, after all one syllable, four letters barely a phoneme, she’s just a noun, common as a lettuce or a paperclip. The woman who wrote it on the other hand is a wreath of bones and blood wrapped round … Continue reading

Author : nike
Comments : 11 Comments

fifty-seven (Malurid)

This semester, I’m teaching a writing course called Fairytales & Other Forms. Every week, we read a fairytale in various variants, and the writers in the course are asked to write their own (new!) version. The students are second year undergraduates, who are totally amazing. Every week they surprise and … Continue reading

Author : nike
Comments : 2 Comments

fifty-six (buying beer for poets)

— In honour of World Poetry Day We are on the way to the meeting when one of the poets calls and asks us to pick up beer on the way. Although we are on the phone for a while (the fields of the Lockyer Valley flashing past us, fading … Continue reading

Author : nike
Comments : 4 Comments

fifty-five (while you were away)

I did shoplift something once, when I was a teenager. I went to K-Mart with my best friend and (deliberately) dropped the stolen goods into a milkshake I had purchased especially for that purpose. I don’t remember what the item was that I stole. Intended to steal. In the end, … Continue reading

Author : nike

fifty-four (this is not a story)

I don’t know why I remember that argument with my mother so precisely. We have fought many times, over the years, with increasing frequency. I keep waiting for things to ease off. To reach that moment I have heard about when she sees me as a woman, and I see … Continue reading

Author : nike
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