Spent the morning writing and editing. Checked my email. Read a press release on Tim Sinclair's new poetry book Re: Reading the Dictionary. Clicked the link. Bought it. Downloaded it. Read it from A to Z. Loved it. Wanted to tell you about it right away. Each piece from 'Afflatus' to 'Zombie, Philosophical' takes a … Continue reading Read just now: Re: Reading the Dictionary by Tim Sinclair
poetry
Guest review: Greg Westenberg on The Geometry of Flight by Angela Smith
Pulse Publications, 2010, 9780646540443 In naming her poetry collection The Geometry of Flight Angela Smith, like Indiana Jones in The Last Crusade, ‘chose wisely’. More wisely, more selflessly, than perhaps she realised. She has given multiple doorways to her work with the single phrase: porticos that set the reader’s path through the work, paths that … Continue reading Guest review: Greg Westenberg on The Geometry of Flight by Angela Smith
I wrote a winning haiku
I'm very excited to announce that a little haiku I wrote one morning is the winner of Australian Poetry's haiPhone competition. It goes: Potential faces In steamy bathroom mirrors Residue of stars I've been invited to read it out as part of the Emerging Writers' Festival on 1 June at the Poetry Cafe. G told me … Continue reading I wrote a winning haiku
Ashes in the Air by Ali Alizadeh
This review first appeared in the March 2011 issue of Bookseller+Publisher magazine. UQP, March 2011 (Aus) 9780702238727 What do we want from a book of poetry? We want each poem to paint a picture, to shake us up a little, and to ultimately reach down inside us and peel something back. Ali Alizadeh’s poems do all … Continue reading Ashes in the Air by Ali Alizadeh
Guest review: Greg Westenberg on John Mateer’s The West: Australian Poems 1989–2009
Fremantle Press, 2010 (Aus, US, UK) 9781921361869 Remember that Renaissance sculpture you admired, briefly, in a Roman or Florentine church, cool and hard and chiselled and, perhaps a little too dramatically posed? Reading John Mateer’s collection of poems The West, gives an analogous sensation. The sculptors worked in marble that kept its material nature, the hardness … Continue reading Guest review: Greg Westenberg on John Mateer’s The West: Australian Poems 1989–2009
Guest review: Derek Motion on Tiggy Johnson’s First Taste
Page Seventeen, 2010 9780980813609 Reviewed by Derek Motion I often have to catch the bus out to the university, and from the stop near my house the journey takes around 15 minutes. This parcel of time is – if you get straight on to the task and don’t waste any time looking out the window … Continue reading Guest review: Derek Motion on Tiggy Johnson’s First Taste
Guest review: Raili Simojoki on harvest: issue 5
harvest: issue 5 reviewed by Raili Simojoki Harvest ’s gentle, reflective, sometimes anxious writing appeals to Gen Y romantics who, dissatisfied by the disconnected, disposable information generated by mass media, are drawn instead to the poetic, intricate, and meandering. Editor Davina Bell speaks directly to this audience in her essay ‘To my Generation of Precious … Continue reading Guest review: Raili Simojoki on harvest: issue 5
Guest review: Greg Westenberg on Maxine Clarke’s Gil Scott Heron is on Parole
Gil Scott Heron is on Parole Maxine Beneba Clarke Picaro Press Reviewed by Greg Westenberg The rhythm: insistent, consistent, beat-heavy in places but with enough sunlight in the words to take us out of the club, into a community’s irregular syncopation; the rhythm, that I couldn’t always get (white boys, everybody knows it, can’t … Continue reading Guest review: Greg Westenberg on Maxine Clarke’s Gil Scott Heron is on Parole
Adam Ford on life, superheroes, poetry, his Twitter novel and The Third Fruit is a Bird
Who is your favourite superhero and why? I'd love to say it's some less-well-known-to-the-general-public superhero like Machine Man or Metamorpho, but to be honest it's a tie between Superman and Spider-Man, partly because their costumes are so striking and colourful, partly because they're both nice-guy superheroes who always try to use their powers to help … Continue reading Adam Ford on life, superheroes, poetry, his Twitter novel and The Third Fruit is a Bird
Longing and the Aftermath of Something
Recorded during the event 'See What I'm Talking About', Overload Poetry Festival 2009. Response to Andrew Watson's photograph (in background). Video by my lovely sister Sonja Meyer. Here's a review of the whole event by Simonne Michelle Wells on the Overland blog.
LiteraryMinded 