refractory gang —
eyes, toes, night sweats
a heart overthrown
like my dad I yell
at the screen, what new thing now?
Image: Skeleton dancers and band on theatre stage, Sydney, c. 1928. Photographer unknown c/- State Library of New South Wales on Flickr. Musing on the body and what we inherit (including a dodgy heart) from our parents…
And for music today – here’s Gianluca Littera on harmonica with Quartetto Energie Nove playing with Gordon Jacob’s Divertimento for Harmonica and Strings (Youtube). The whole album’s worth exploring (as long as the harmonica wasn’t spoiled for you by listening to years of Max Geldray playing in the musical intermissions on The Goon Show on the BBC).
such a battle
just reading your poetry
mosquitoes dance the page
she will inherit (not us)
— how she sings the harvest
Image: untitled by Daniel Iván on Flickr. A piece inspired by Rodney Jones’ poem about war and violence The Mosquito – which I was reading in my kitchen at 5am under attack from the subject of his poem (the last line is taken from his poem).
And for music today here’s some uplifting “nature punk” from US band/singer Hurray for the Riff-Raff – with Life on Earth (Youtube) (The whole album is gorgeous and recommended).
barely waves, turquoise
lift and settle
of surfers
collective supplication
anything, send us anything
Image: Harold Salvage sunbaking, “The Sunbather” from Camping trips on Culburra Beach by Max Dupain and Olive Cotton c/- State Library of NSW on Flickr
Music this morning, here’s Australian musician Andrew Tuttle with reminiscence of Alexandra (Youtube has the live performance), very chill – banjo, cicadas and sprinklers on the lawns – and no surf today.
Music this morning, something uplifting featuring my favourite mezzo Cecillia Bartoli. Here’s Agostino Steffani (no relation to Gwen) with Stabat Mater (Youtube)
bluebag of a day
one quick dunking
final rinse the sky
then hung brighter
flower the very bee
Image by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash. Today was one of those cloudless perfect days that a friend described as a ‘bluebag’. This referenced Reckitt & Coleman’s laundry product, a history of laundry and the (incomplete and wildly speculative) wikipedia entry for bluing (fabric): bee sting remedies, hoodoo spells and blue hands.
Unrelated, for music this morning here’s Cecilia Bartoli with cellist Sol Gabetta with some sweet duets (youtube)
blown sand blocks our street
duneland has returned
like the past
finds us oddly
unready its tidings
Image: Dunes south of Port Kembla, c. 1940s c/- Wollongong Library. A tanka inspired by the brief closure of a local road after a few days of strong southerlies. This area was subject to some ‘dune shaping’ recently by the local council which involved removal of foredune vegetation which (in my view) helped stabilise the sand. That said, the past is implacable.
Music this morning, here’s British vocal ensemble Voces8 with a reworking of Radiohead’s Pyramid Song (Youtube).
Wollongong poet, publisher and Australian poetry legend Ron Pretty has published a collection of his work over 50 years of writing.
Poetry shifts so quickly it can be hard to keep up. Sometimes I imagine it as a wave, its front rising up full of new exciting voices; voices that have been ignored or silenced; sassy angry voices talking back to the blandness of popular culture and late stage capitalism; urgent voices insisting we act on environmental destruction now.
“Jackson’s book is an extraordinary poetic exploration of his own disability – Marfan’s syndrome, which is disfiguring and distorts the shape of his face and body. His poems are blistering in their power, wonderfully subtle, objective and with no self-pity. “
Similarly, this year I listened to readings from a new anthology Admissions from Red Room Poetry, poems written from the lived experience of mental illness. My warmest memory of that night is as one of the poets came to the critical point in the poem he was struck dumb, overcome with emotion. And we, a room of 80 fans and friends, held our breath as the poet found his composure and courage to keep reading. Powerful words indeed.
So what to make of a collection of someone who’s been writing poetry for over 50 years, has published eight full collections and six chapbooks of poetry? To continue the surf metaphor, this poetry is from the green water out beyond the breakers, it’s deep and cool and collected and exhilarating in its own way. Yes, there are experiments in form, in voice and subject but it also points to the evolution of a writer over time.
Recently, I voiced Ron’s words for a program on Radio 3CR in which two of his poetry colleagues — Kevin Brophy and Alex Skovron — read from 101 poems. It’s a terrific program put together by Tina Ginannoukos from the Spoken Word team at 3CR and gives you an introduction to Ron Pretty’s work (a longer extended version is also available).
After listening to this, you’re going to want to immediately order a copy from Ron’s publisher Pitt Street Poetry.
3CR spoken-word program: The work of Ron Pretty, December 22, 2022.
And for music this afternoon (where it’s raining on newly mown summer grass) here’s American composer Caroline Shaw with the Attacca quartet playing Orange (Youtube)
This beautiful little volume edited by Amelia Fielden and assisted by Liz Lanagan collects the work of 35 poets. Wrapped in a glorious colour photo of winter blooming wattle by poet photographer Neva Kastellic, this B5 volume sits comfortably in your hand, in your pocket or on your bookshelf. Each poet presents two tanka (except for Fielden who, as editor, has three) so that’s 10 lines per poet. But there’s never a sense of poets clamouring or competing for attention. Instead, Leaves presents a diversity of voices and a kaleidoscope of views.
The poets are mostly Australian, along with Japanese-Australian poet Saeko Ogi and a guest poet from California, Neal Whitman.
In the preface, Fielden tells us that the expression meaning ‘leaves’ in Japanese kotonoha is a homonym for ‘words’ which also alludes (in the way that everything connects to everything else) to the tanka form itself. A form, she continues, that can be traced back to 10th Century poet, Ki no Tsurayuki who begins his seminal work thus:
‘Japanese poetry has the human heart as seed and myriads of words as leaves.’
Generally, the poems are not of pristine idealised nature but rather nature in urban settings, nature exposing our foibles or nature butting up against us such as, for example, a currawong competing with poet/grower for an olive crop or a caterpillar rescued from being blended into pesto. Nature also provokes, as in this witty piece by Jenny Stewart
cut a little says a wispy native shrub, but not too much ... make a decision you with the rusty shears
There are references to popular culture: my own piece on Elvis (which I’m delighted to have included in this volume) and Kate King’s tanka referencing May Gibbs’ children’s tales of the gumnut babes Snugglepot and Cuddlepie and the scary gang that stalk them
knobbly seed pods pounce from spiky bushes — we still recoil from those gumnut tales of Big Banksia Men
There’s also the achingly contemporary, in Rachel Colombo’s tanka
lonely cherry tree in the wintry Kyiv street a bomb explodes days later buds burst showering pink blossom.
And of course, poets talk about the craft of poetry, as in Amelia Fielden’s tanka
in full thrum cicadas emphasising the summer days — less is more, I tell my tanka students
At the launch of Leaves, one of the poets quipped that tanka was ideal for our times: small, memorable, a poem you can hold in your hand, perfect for the short-attention-span days of twitter and instagram. Yet these poems have depths that you will want to return to as each ‘leaf’ offers a different insight to nature and the human condition in these challenging times.
Leaves, tanka anthology of Nature is available from Australia’s finest small press, Ginninderra Press
It’s been a month since the contractors poisoned the weed that
was choking our suburban lagoon. Still water, mats of black collapse
the shore is quiet. Usually by October the reed warblers would be
full-throated at their young: this our morning song, this an alarm trill this is how to hang a nest on two bent rushes just right. Next year
— maybe. The pelicans mooch about before departing.
An egret wades in the shallows, brilliant
like a tear in a curtain on a summer day.
Yellow eye, yellow blade strikes, catches nothing.
I want to make this bird into something —
in its leanness and pallor, a township starved then razed
or our kids trampling helter skelter through the garden.
Unmoved, the bird stabs again, brings up a string of muck.
It won’t mate this season; it’ll starve if it stays.
I’m thinking how hard it is to say anything cleanly, truly.
Then the real bird lifts, a slow loping climb
over lawns and picnic tables with a loud croaking call
that I couldn’t help but hear as disgust.
Image: An eastern great egret (ardea modesta) c/- David Clode at Unsplash, similar to the one so disappointed at our local lagoon.
And for music today, here’s Grown Ocean… “a large ensemble project by Sydney-based musician Novak Manojlovic”. with Memory Gardens (Youtube), which features songs inspired by the Illawarra NSW – where this poem was written. Maybe start with Rail Line, What Runs thru Coast & Colliery tho it’s all good.
Peter Frankis writes 