murder

I’m in Canberra for the weekend and even though we are in the second month of Spring it is freezing down here. Freezing!

But that makes for perfect blog weather. Both reading and writing.

Here is a poem I wrote a couple of years ago when reflecting on the legal difficulties asylum seekers and refugees face trying to resettle in Australia.

I share it with you in the hope that one day our system will better reflect the generosity that exists in the hearts of all caring Australians.

 

Murder

Do crows come together

and think any further

than their own feathered nest

and the ever open sky?

 

Do they keep wary watch

for          lorrikeets

rosellas

galahs

with names hard to say

hard to spell?

 

coloured intruders

flee to the mix

then

f

a

l

l

slipping

off the

slick

black

silk

of backs. turned. outwards.

my sailor friend tells me

the navy still uses yardarms

but crow’s-nests – well,

they’ve gone out of fashion

We have better methods of spotting the intruder.

 

July, 2014

Unseasonal Haiku

 

The weather in my mountain village has been all sixes and sevens. Autumn was cancelled for the year, apparently, as we went from summer to more summer and only recently into the recognisable chill of a temperate Sydney winter.

You will remember that my last post had me using a beading session to overcome my fear of writing a project proposal for my graduate research. Well, I finished the proposal off and sent it in this morning! I was so chuffed. Even an unseasonal blowfly in the house was cause for poetic inspiration:

Oh, confused blowfly,
This winter visitation
Will leave you mateless.