Poetry

IN HARD TIMES IT IS STILL ONE STEP AFTER ANOTHER. By Colleen Keating

colleen General, Poetry , , , , , , ,

 

The magnet on the fridge door shines at me every-time
one step after another
and it has saved me through many times
where my steps have faltered
in the darkest nights where you fear the next step
in thick storms where the rain pelters piercing your very skin
in coldest times when your bones seem frozen
and now you see the words today
and only a mountain looms at you and it hurls rocks
on the way you try to obey and clamber and then you realise
you are not the only one attempting to go on.
Colleen

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********** A few strs shining brightly:***********
Lindsay McLaughlin from Friends of Silence
Ellen Bass poet
Christine Valters Paintner Abbess
Shakespeare
David Whyte
Waymakers

We must remind ourselves that millions of human beings throughout history have lived through worse political situations and still managed to make art, and find joy, and share meals and resist despair, We can do that . moving always towards wisdom.
In fact, cover us all in a wisdom that is not available in memes, hot takes, social media fake news and mis communications and the continuous news which sucks us down a rabbit hole. Some people thrive on chaos and can use chaos as smokes and mirrors .

Let us remember to breathe often, drink water and be always grateful for the nature and beauty around us every day.

 

THE WAY IS AWKWARD

By the river it is cool and gray at last after a night of longed-for rain, however intermittent. Mist this morning clung to the trees, but it is gone now, leaving the caress of quiet moist air. The river is low, the banks brown, rock outcroppings breaking the water; but yet it flows, an ancient witness; as is the moss, growing up the north side of the oaks and box elders and sycamores, whose branches, sparse with brown and yellow leaves, form a wild weave against the pewter sky.  A heron, guardian of edges, rises from the mud and glides in a wide arc to other shore.

I am here because the rocks and arrows hurled at all I have known, and all that I love, reached a new level of ferocity last week, and it seems that the speed and strength of the barrage will be relentless. Even after years of preparatory soul work, suddenly I can barely breathe. I thought the humbling might continue to creep toward us, with some mercy. Instead, the gods of mayhem spurred the horses.

In the wake of this, words have swirled: words to soothe, advise, comfort, inspire. I have passed them on, shared them; I am grateful for them all. But what I need may not be the call to march forward, to align with the highest benchmarks of humanity, to hold fast and to take skillful action, to neither wince nor flail. I need refugia and the wisdom of ancient beings like a river, trees, and moss.

Kathleen Dean Moore speaks of refugia in her book Great Tide Rising. Refugia are pockets of safety, tiny coverts where life hides from destruction, secret shelters out of which new life emerges. Refugia are why Mount Saint Helen’s mountainsides are lushly covered with grasses, prairie lupines, and alders, despite the eruption that erased 1,300 feet of the mountain and burned 230 square miles of forest.

Refugia are small and hidden and full of darkness, but they are potent. They may be characterized as sanctuaries, but they are cauldrons, wombs, incubators. They are everywhere: in a poem, the eyes of a friend, a preserved landscape, a permaculture garden, a prayer in the wild.

So I have come to the river, the stone cliffs, the moss growing on those old trees. Robin Wall Kimmerer writes, “Mosses, I think, are like time made visible…The mosses remember that this is not the first time the glaciers have melted…”, or a political system has failed. Kimmerer points out that mosses document a passage of time that is not linear. “…the knowledge we need,” she says, “is already within the circle; we just have to remember to find it again…”

There are beings on this planet older by far than elections and democracy, older than civilization, older even than the human imagination. They are here to turn to, to help us begin to breathe again. Four hundred fifty million years ago mosses traveled from the primordial waters and began a great experiment in evolution, as Kimmerer writes, “an experiment of which we are all a part, whose ending is unwritten.”

Unwritten, and unknown. Some would say that is the definition of hope, an invitation to act out of our places of refugia, out of the wisdom of mosses, rather than reaction to the certainty of the dystopia we think we know has arrived.

Bayo Akomolafe says, “the way is awkward, not forward”. Perhaps that is the challenge: To stumble around, feeling for the opening of the path that is hardly a path at all, is many-branching, possibly strange, and made by walking. To listen to wisdom and voices beyond the scope of human intelligence, to other ways of knowing rising from other places of power, to tune to the rhythm of the river and the whispers of moss.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Thing Is

to love life, to love it even

when you have no stomach for it

and everything you’ve held dear

crumbles like burnt paper in your hands,

your throat filled with the silt of it.

When grief sits with you, its tropical heat

thickening the air, heavy as water

more fit for gills than lungs;

when grief weights you down like your own flesh

only more of it, an obesity of grief,

you think, How can a body withstand this?

Then you hold life like a face

between your palms, a plain face,

no charming smile, no violet eyes,

and you say, yes, I will take you

I will love you, again.

Ellen Bass

by Eleanor Keating-Jones age 8  April 2024

A Note from your Abbess

There is much uncertainty and unknown right now. Many of us are in deep grief and I encourage you to bestow lavish hospitality on all of your feelings – let your rage, sadness, despair, confusion, and more have space in you. Move your body, let her speak its wisdom, and give yourself the gift of as much rest as possible.

 

What I do know is that our commitment to a contemplative path does make a difference. Keep showing up with presence to what is real and true. Cherish what is beautiful and kind. Commit to the slowness and centeredness that is its own kind of resistance and from which deep change arises. Know that the ground is Love and we are each radiant sparks of the divine. And act on behalf of the liberation of all beings from these touchstones.

 

What I also know is that our commitment to creativity is vital. We must continue to cultivate our wild imaginings. Dance and write poems and songs that help us to lament and hope, to make space to dream and be, to let our visions of what is possible take even deeper root in our hearts. This is our life force at work in partnership with Spirit to bring about a more beautiful world.

 

And the third thing I know is that community is key to all of this. Reach out to a soul friend; gather in small groups to grieve and laugh. Extend the most exquisite kindness to the people you encounter in public spaces, especially those you experience as“other.” Ask for the blessings of your ancestors who endured their own suffering and struggles. Stand in a grove of trees or on the banks of a river and feel your kinship with all creation. And of course, gather with your fellow dancing monks in our programs when possible. To know yourself as not alone, but intimately connected to the delicate and intricate web of all living beings is to claim your power and to live in hope.

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FROM WAYMAKERS

Yesterday, I walked with one of my dearest friends. We did what I imagine many of you are doing after the November 5th elections: reaching out, checking in, feeling the weight of not knowing where our next step will land. It seems clear that, whatever that step might be, it needs to be taken together. So, we locked arms and walked into the sacred, uneasy threshold—a place where one foot is lifted in resistance and resolve but hasn’t quite touched down. This act, balancing on the edge of action, is like a yogic stance, holding our ground in discomfort, wondering when we’ll feel the relief of solid ground again.

This is statio—the ancient, mystical practice of pausing intentionally in the in-between to create sacred space. Statio is the pause that marks a threshold, a moment both of waiting and readiness. It invites us to cultivate hope, courage, and resilience by resting right there in the gap, to find strength in stillness, to gather ourselves in this space between breaths, even when exhaustion tempts us toward fear. And this pause? It’s a place beyond our control; crossing through it may take longer than we ever expected. *Statio* divides one time from another, one ground from the next, and yet, the actual crossing may be guided by forces beyond us, by something holy holding us back until the moment is ripe.

How long can we dwell in statio, with one foot suspended, unsure of where it will land? I don’t know how long. But I know we can hold it longer when there are hands and shoulders to lean on. Who are you holding onto during this collective statio?

As my friend and I walked, we were pulled to a stop by awe: the blue sky’s vast embrace, the proclamation of yellow leaves, and the way the trees’ canopy offered space to one another. This phenomenon—crown shyness—is a fitting metaphor for statio, a sacred space honoring both separation and connection. Just as trees leave intentional gaps between their crowns, letting light and air breathe through the canopy, statio invites us to create a pause between our thoughts, actions, and encounters. These intentional spaces, like the quiet channels between branches, honor the life force within each moment, allowing renewal, clarity, and shared energy to circulate freely, allowing grief to have space to move, and to not rush towards the next agenda and action.

In both statio and crown shyness, there’s a quiet reverence for boundaries that actually deepens interdependence. Trees, by keeping respectful distance, support an ecosystem that nurtures both individual growth and communal vitality. Likewise, when we create pauses in our lives, we make space to connect more deeply to ourselves and to each other.

In my own personal seasons of statio, I find myself drawn to practices that root me deeply in the earth. These grounding rituals connect me to place, bringing me back to the particulars of my own environment and reminding me that small, intentional acts can ripple outward with profound impact. This is the time for nature mandalas, for wandering in wild spaces (urban wilds count too!), for brewing forest tea from what’s nearby, for returning to a quiet sit spot, and for practicing sacred phenology.

These simple, earth-centered practices offer a way to be present in this communal time of statio, each one anchoring us in the now, helping us listen, and encouraging us to become more attentive to the unique rhythms of life within our particular landscapes. These rituals will offer profound guidance when we take our next steps.

 

 

 John of Gaunt speech in Richard 11. from Shakespeare

His rash fierce blaze of riot cannot last, 

For violent fires soon burn out themselves; 
Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short; 
He tires betimes that spurs too fast betimes; 
With eager feeding food doth choke the feeder: 
Light vanity, insatiate cormorant,
Consuming means, soon preys upon itself.

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And Parker J. Palmer says:

Trust has been one of the big losers in this era of American politics—and trust is what we must restore if we are to reweave and transform the tattered fabric of our common life. So let’s begin close in, with people we know to be trustworthy. And let’s keep expanding the circle to those who “stand in need” the way we do.

For the past three days, I’ve had a chance to do just that with groups ranging from 4 to 25 to 1,000. It’s been healing and empowering for me.

Slowly, slowly, I’m finding ground beneath my feet again. Slowly, slowly, in the lives of my friends, colleagues, and strangers I’m seeing the bright stars V.P. Harris talked about in her concession speech—good people doing going work against stiff odds—stars that are best seen against the backdrop of a midnight sky.

David Whyte has it right: turn off the noise of what people call “the news.” Tune in to the news of the human heart where ground and guidance for the journey can always be found. Exercise the muscle called trust whenever and wherever we can—and then reach out in trust to one more and one more and one more.

No one is going to rescue us, so let’s start rebuilding a community devoted to the common good from the inside out and from the ground up. We’re all hungry, and we can feed each other.

[David Whyte’s books are at http://tiny.cc/0q7uzz. My 10 books are at http://tiny.cc/r3gtzz.]

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Kamala Harris:

“Good afternoon. Thank you all, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. So let me say, and I love you back. And I love you back. So let me say, my heart is full today. My heart is full today. Full of gratitude for the trust you have placed in me, full of love for our country and full of resolve. The outcome of this election is not what we wanted, not what we fought for, not what we voted for. But hear me when I say, hear me when I say, the light of America’s promise will always burn bright. As long as we never give up, and as long as we keep fighting.

To my beloved Doug and our family, I love you so very much. To President Biden and Doctor Biden, thank you for your faith and support. To Governor Walz and the Walz family, I know your service to our nation will continue. And to my extraordinary team, to the volunteers who gave so much of themselves, to the poll workers and the local election officials, I thank you, I thank you all.

Look, I am so proud of the race we ran and the way we ran it and the way we ran it. Over the 107 days of this campaign, we have been intentional about building community and building coalitions, bringing people together from every walk of life and background, united by love of country with enthusiasm and joy in our fight for America’s future. And we did it with the knowledge that we all have so much more in common than what separates us.

Now, I know folks are feeling and experiencing a range of emotions right now. I get it. But we must accept the results of this election. Earlier today, I spoke with president-elect Trump and congratulated him on his victory. I also told him that we will help him and his team with their transition and that we will engage in a peaceful transfer of power. A fundamental principle of American democracy is that when we lose an election, we accept the results. That principle, as much as any other, distinguishes democracy from monarchy or tyranny. And anyone who seeks the public trust must honor it.

At the same time, in our nation, we owe loyalty, not to a president or a party, but to the Constitution of the United States, and loyalty to our conscience and to our God. My allegiance to all three is why I am here to say, while I concede this election, I do not concede the fight that fueled this campaign. The fight, the fight for freedom, for opportunity, for fairness and the dignity of all people. A fight for the ideals at the heart of our nation. The ideals that reflect America at our best. That is a fight I will never give up. I will never give up the fight for a future where Americans can pursue their dreams, ambitions and aspiration is where the women of America have the freedom to make decisions about their own body and not have their government telling them what to do. We will never give up the fight to protect our schools and our streets from gun violence. And America, we will never give up the fight for our democracy, for the rule of law, for equal justice, and for the sacred idea that every one of us, no matter who we are or where we start out, has certain fundamental rights and freedoms that must be respected and upheld. And we will continue to wage this fight in the voting booth, in the courts and in the public square. And we will also wage it in quieter ways, in how we live our lives, by treating one another with kindness and respect, by looking in the face of a stranger and seeing a neighbour, by always using our strength to lift people up, to fight for the dignity that all people deserve.

The fight for our freedom will take hard work. But like I always say, we like hard work. Hard work is good work. Hard work can be joyful work, and the fight for our country is always worth it. It is always worth it. To the young people who are watching, it is, I love you. To the young people who are watching it is okay to feel sad and disappointed, but please know it’s going to be okay. On the campaign, I would often say when we fight, we win. But here’s the thing, here’s the thing. Sometimes the fight takes a while. That doesn’t mean we won’t win. That doesn’t mean we won’t win. The important thing is don’t ever give up, don’t ever give up, don’t ever stop trying to make the world a better place. You have power. You have power and don’t you ever listen when anyone tells you something is impossible because it has never been done before. You have the capacity to do extraordinary good in the world.

And so to everyone who is watching, do not despair. This is not a time to throw up our hands. This is a time to roll up our sleeves. This is a time to organize, to mobilize, and to stay engaged for the sake of freedom and justice and the future that we all know we can build together. Look many of you know, I started out as a prosecutor, and throughout my career I saw people at some of the worst times in their lives, people who had suffered great harm and great pain and yet found within themselves the strength and the courage and the resolve to take the stand, to take a stand, to fight for justice, to fight for themselves, to fight for others. So let their courage be our inspiration. Let their determination be our charge.

And I’ll close with this. There’s an adage an historian once called a law of history, true of every society across the ages. The adage is only when it is dark enough can you see the stars. I know many people feel like we are entering a dark time, but for the benefit of us all, I hope that is not the case. But here’s the thing, America, if it is, let us fill the sky with the light of a brilliant, brilliant billion of stars. The light, the light of optimism, of faith, of truth and service. HU (Howard University). And may that work guide us, even in the face of setbacks toward the extraordinary promise of the United States of America. I thank you all, may God bless you and may God bless the United States of America. I thank you all.”

 

 

 

 

VALE Stephen Matthews OAM by Colleen Keating

colleen Poetry , , ,

Stephen Matthews OAM, founder of Ginninderra Press passed away on Wednesday 25 September 2024. 

I REMEMBER THE EXCITEMENT WHEN STEPHEN WAS RECOMMENDED FOR THE AOM.

There was great excitement about what to wear at the garden party at Governors’House and all the feelings about the honour . Brenda kept all the accolation and it was so well deserved. Now I look back and am thrilled Stepen was honoured while he was well and that we could all ho

Stephen accepted my first book of poetry to be published by his publishing house Ginninderra Press.  I had had severeal rejections and I was over the moon to receive his acceptance. It took a year from acceptance to publication  it was a hard journey to get a cover and blurbs, introduction and dedication but finally  A Call to Listen was out in the world like a new babe coming into first light.  Of course it affirmed me as a poet and encouraged me to write more and hence further books arrived . I am not the only one.  Hundreds of poets have had the same success with Stephen as he affirmed and published more and more poets bringing their light to the world. His partner Brenda worked at Chapbooks and a publication The Crow bringing more poetry into the world.

What a tragedy for cancer to return and knock Stephen around for a second time and to watch their world come tumbling down.   Stephen sold the publishing business to Debbie and we hope to continue so that poets are heard in this very noisy world where poetry is neglected because not many have the time or space these days to enjoy.

In 2019 Stephen and Brenda came from South Australia where they were established to launch a new book Mountain Mist a Ginninderra Anthology and to incorporate Brenda’s 70th birthday and we met and got to know each other . It was a real Ginninderra Family Celebration.

 

 

 

 

 

     

 

DEBBIE WROTE

I first met Stephen as a young publisher’s representative when he was manager of the ANU Uni Coop. It was the heyday of publishing, when hardbacks preceded paperbacks, literary fiction and non-fiction titles were piled high, launches de rigueur and sales abounding. 

As a bookseller, Stephen was discerning and erudite and as well-read as they come. Perhaps not surprising given his Cambridge University education in the classics, moral science and philosophy. Stephen taught high school history both prior to emigrating to Australia and for some years upon his arrival. Subsequently, his joy in books radiated in the writing of reviews, author profiles and articles for the Canberra Times and the Australian Book Review journal, as well assessing manuscripts for large publishing houses, and judging literary competitions and awards.

As mainstream publishing began to contract with acquisitions and mergers upsetting the status quo, Stephen somewhat counterintuitively saw an opportunity. In 1996 Ginninderra Press was born with the express mission of publishing new and emerging authors, relative unknowns, writing in eclectic, not always fashionable genres, books that did not necessarily have a commercial orientation, but books that mattered, nonetheless. Traversing poetry, memoir, history, novella, anthology and non-fiction prose, the primary criteria – that these were titles in which Stephen believed.

Over the course of the next 28 years, taking in a move from Canberra to Port Adelaide in 2008, the milestones have been many. More than 3000 titles have been published and in excess of 300,000 books sold. Awards have rolled in and accolades ensued. In addition to publishing via traditional means, Stephen adopted print-on-demand, enabling global access for the Ginninderra Press list. He also lovingly compiled a series of ‘chap books’ (20-paged, stapled books of poetry) by hand, such was his dedication.  

While many Ginninderra Press titles constitute meditations on the human condition, much of the list has been intentionally geared toward matters of social, cultural and political concern. In 2003, in response to the devastating Canberra fires, Stephen commissioned How Did the Fire Know We Lived Here raising over $73,000 for the cause. In March this year, Stephen’s swansong, Telling Australia’s Truth comprised120 poems by GP authors expressing the shame, sadness and disbelief that was felt by many after the result of the Voice referendum.

In Rays of Light – Ginninderra Press, The First Twenty Years, one contributing author referred to Ginninderra as ‘a small but significant publisher of small but significant books’. Stephen’s wife, Brenda – herself a prolific poet – talks about the sense of community and of giving back or ‘paying it forward’. In 2021, Stephen Matthews was officially recognised with an Order of Australia Medal for his service to publishing. His contribution to the writing community and support for local authors has indeed thrown ‘little rays of light’ across Australia. It is an honour and a privilege to be carrying Ginninderra Press forward and so his remarkable legacy may live on.

Debbie Lee, Ginninderra Press

 

Highly Commended Award in the 2024 A New Day Dawns

colleen Poetry, Poetry Awards , , ,

Poetry distils language and ideas through clarity and brevity, breath and heart, surprising as it explores. The poems in this enlightened anthology are beautifully made and closely observed. Startling formal poems sit beside free verse, rhymes beside carefully enjambed rambles. The poems invite and open us to possibilities, revealing the world and ourselves in new ways. Their honest, felt tributes to family, faith and nature expose imagination and ask a shared experience. Enjoy the newness nestled within these pages; explore, and savour the dawning. TRU S. DOWLING Poet, Writer & Editor

Poetica Christi Press Poetry Competition 2024 –

          A new day dawns Judge’s Report

I so enjoyed the taxing but rewarding task of choosing from this year’s 196 entries. Poems varied in length, topic, and depth; all were true to the enlightened theme. There were many worthy, beautifully-made poems. Free verse outnumbered the few formal poems (villanelles, sonnets, haiku and prose poems, an acrostic poem, and a delightful concrete hybrid in Sudoku form!). Honest tributes to family, faith & nature dominated, as did literal dawn descriptors. It’s a challenge to write about ‘The Dawn of a New Day’ – such a universal, known and written theme. Some poems told (rather than showed the reader through sensory details and fresh images), slipping into cliches that undermined the unique lines. Poetry invites and opens us to possibilities, revealing the world and ourselves in new ways. The better poems explored these possibilities with nuanced expression.

Poetry distils language and ideas. Its clarity and brevity captures, surprises and explores. (Webster defines the verb explore: ‘to travel in or through’). The finalist poems travel rhythmic trails through scrub and sky, on bikes and waves, in the past and other lands, where ‘bells fill our heads’ and ‘stars glint like enamel’, where a ‘cat sits with dreams’ and we are ‘lost in…raven’s hue’, as ‘the future hides behind the moon’ and ‘we wake to everything’, ‘with probing beak(s)’. These are some of the stunning lines that held me with their woven originality and sealed my 25 choices.

The winning poem, Ellen Shelley’s ‘Wild With Scrub’, wowed with its surprising turns of phrase and direction. Shelley tracks the narrator’s challenges through concrete and abstract images, metaphor and paradox, ‘turning hours like a sleeve up and over’ – beautifully exacting the effort of being a mum – to ‘I have done enough (walking/ escaping) to turn around’ towards the poem’s end. ‘A new day dawns’ at each effort, as momentum marries flow throughout. It’s a tight, meandering and carefully-crafted poem that demonstrates its meaning through expert wordplay. It causes me to wonder and feel, and speaks to other, universal journeys of culture and gender.

Second place was hard won, since three poems particularly took my attention: again, Ellen Shelley excels as runner-up with ‘A Cool September Eve’ –her surprising prose poem. I have taught short story for 16 years so am quite skeptical towards this hybrid form, but Shelley’s mastery of well-placed words that enlighten realization within the setting won me over. The structure supports content via word choice, and sensory action and reaction. The subject’s running pastime in past time, ‘around an oval’, along with the ‘bike …being held by a/ stranger… (I) felt strange/ unease’ hints at a skewed experience. Again, the poet takes us far, from home safety to threat, and through the redeeming sustenance of habit. It’s a highly original poem that evokes theme all the way through.

Colleen Keating’s ‘Fifth Symphony’ balances an artist’s response to the destruction around him, and the poet’s response – both witnesses to the ongoing ‘music that plays like a mountain brook tumbling’. It’s a deceptively simple, nuanced poem. The poet contrasts fire watch to water music, amidst sounds that ‘cry for’ an eventual new dawn, transforming the moment and beyond along with the lyricist’s crucial work. Keating’s exacting metaphor exposes a paradox, conjuring beauteous composition out of the chaos of war. It was a strong contender for second place, as was ‘High Jinx’ by Laurie Keim. Keim’s structure riffed on and overtook the poetic subject – watching (and becoming) birds. Lines like wings extended imagination to see these avian ‘signs’ resulting in the narrator’s realization that ‘it’s all in your fingertips/feel the breeze/ like a tremble/ through your feathers’. It’s uplifting, in every sense. There’s a touch of Mary Oliver about this poem, a complexity through simplicity as thought and sight explore and expand meaning in air, flight in birds, knowing power in unknowing. These gifts are so carefully and care-freely rendered by form. All three were well- wrought poems.

It’s been my pleasure to engage and immerse myself in these poems of laughter, intensity, care, and fruitfulness. What a humbling, inspiring exercise. Congratulations to all poets involved – long may your art and craft continue to grow and affect. Thank you for the experience.

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Tru Dowling, 2024

 

 

A poem about my rose that burst into new life while I turned my back

colleen Poetry

 

Golden Child

There is a quiet spirit in the thorn-piercing 

branches of the pruned rose; all winter 

it stayed silent, seeming dead

 

and when you watch and wait, the mystery of nature

out-watches and out-waits. You hear only chilly

winds through its bareness then, in absence

 

from watching  its awakening,  stirs.

Like the first clarinet notes

of Copland’s Appalachian Spring, its first leaves 

 

appear, their palms upturned calling the sun-

spirit down, the turning.too marvellous 

to be understood, as buds burst on the scene; 

 

a prodigal-rose, its golden cascade returning

to the garden, its petals, curled cubbies

for bees, fragrant on the air.

 

You can hear its tender voice on the spring breeze

and imagine the spirit-bloom of roses; 

their legends singing all over the world.

 

Colleen Keating

 

   

 

 

 

 

New Tanka written for consideration by the Eucalypt Journal

colleen Poetry , ,
 Tanka for consideration by Eucalypt Journal 
beach lookout
a springtime visitor
rolls and flaps about
silver glints on its flippers
keep us transfixed
a lone seagull
on a busy city street
far from the harbour
sometimes I wish I had wings
to find my way home
         
furry banksia cones
perch on gnarled branches
some follicles open
the child in me still sees
the old banksia man
an unkept park ~
neglect or rewilding
we wander amid
a bevy of birds, insects
and blossoming weeds
wet sand
of ebbing tide
reflects a pink dawn
my bare feet encounter
the first touch of spring
an empty sky 
where the blue gum stood –
returning birds
perch on a brick wall
chirping incessantly

Haiku recently accepted and published.

colleen Poetry , ,

  1. Haiku Down Under Anthology

Dear Colleen,

Thank you for your submission to the Haiku Down Under Anthology.
Hard to choose just one, but I have  pleasure in accepting the following poem:

holiday cottage
under a sickle moon
a lone dingo howls

~ Colleen Keating
Kur-ring-gai,  Australia

Please check that the poem, your name, town and country  are correct.

I will let you know as soon as I have details re the purchase of HDU Anthology.

We are so glad you were part of Haiku Down Under.

Warm wishes

Carole Harrison

(HDU Editorial team)

 

 

2. Echidna Tracks   Open

(on 15th July 2024)

my haiku for the Anthology 12

by the river
corellas scramble for space
solitary ironbark

Colleen Keating

My haiku accepted for the Antholgy 11:   the Summer/Autumn 2025

hi Colleen
Thank you for your submission to Echidna Tracks Issue 14
we are very pleased to accept;
ebbing tide—
the beachcomber treasures
her amble
Colleen Keating
as a long time beach walker i very much relate to this one
all the best
Simon Hanson
Marilyn Humbert
Lynette Arden
ebbing tide—
the beachcomber treasures
her amble
Colleen Keating

 

 

Reflecting on September 2024

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A full spring equinox moon holds its perfection just for a moment and we clasp hands North and South equal day and night, equal sharing of light and dark in a beautiful albeit fickle world.  

out the window  
I look up at the spring moon 
and looking down 
think of my family 
ten thousand miles away

and with war raging in Ukraine, Sudan and the Middle East  spiralling out of control with no one power enough to stop tyrants of Netanhaou and Putin. as the  calls of the International Community  falls on the deaf ears of tyrants.

for the children
wherever their young eyes look
fear meets them
as fire flares from the heavens
as their earth is charred black

a Mariupol cry 
‘they have turned our town 
into a dead place’ 

On a personal level it has been a sad and heavy –laden week  and I will share the grief of my week and my way through it all.

My dear  friend Jan who lovingly and couragously married earlier this year,  has let me know her  husband,  David has passed with his decision that the fight was becoming too hard  and slowly over days letting go’. 

My special friend and publisher of my books, someone who believed in poetry and writing and helped me get my words out into the world  Stephen Matthews, choosing to take control through VAD and planning the day and time to “to go gently into that great light”. 

 My friend Decima falls and breaks her humerus and shoulder and is in rehab.

My close school friend  Shannie,  her BP goes wacko and she falls, fractures her pelvis and now in heart ward,   A dear important person in my life suffering in marriage troubles.

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old age ~
its story fills me with grief
and fear
nature, poetry, music
bring back a feeling of youth

 

 

..

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Some of my redeeming beautiful experiences this past month

Our poetry appreciation  U3A group.   Michael and I prepared and presented  a Margaret Atwood Appreciation morning.

White Pebbles Ginko Spring Walk

 

Ethel Turner 130th Celebration of the first publication of Seven Little Australians

 

Mahler 4th and  selections from Strauss including Morgan Opus.27.No. 4 SSO ConcertConcert

“Of his friend, who was to outlive him by more than three decades, Mahler said: “Strauss and I tunnel from opposite sides of the mountain. One day we shall meet.”

 

.

Strauss  beautiful song

 

Nature Walk in the Kalkari Reserve part of the Bobbin Head National Park where where Michael and I wondered :

What if the trees could talk!

 

‘    

 

An hour of Classic Chinese Poetry  put on by the Chines cultural

Centre

as part of the Nanping Tea Culture Week in Australia.

An hour of Classic Chinese Poetry  put on by the Chines cultural
as part of the Nanping Tea Culture Week in Australia.

 

The MCA  Contemporary Art Museum

The main exhibition i spent time with , was an installation  called

‘Once Again  . . .(Statues Never Dies)

It interested me because it looked at artifacts from Africa   And spoke of the Colonial pilfering and made me reflect on my New Guineas story. I always see something that carches my eye and the sculpture  below  touched my heart.

In another exhibition I loved a shell sculpture  made of the Sydney Opera House

Now this sculpture, Shellwork (Sydney Opera House)   has extra meaning.

it is created by Esme Timbery and encrusted with thousands of shells. It is one of the largest shellworked models made by Esme.  The subject The Opera House  sits at Tubowgule/Bennelong Point is known as a location of great significence to Aboriginal people. Known as a place of important cultural gatherings for the local Gadigal people , the site was once occupied by a giant shell midden. Middens are mounds formed from the residues of communial life, and in coastal areas they include many shells, remnants of an abundant food source. The midden was a record of ongoing occupation going back thousands of years, the lost form now echoed in Timberlys sheeled model of the UNESCO World Heritage listed Building.

 

Celebrating the Life of Robert Gray with the launch of his new book Bright Crockery Days at the Sydney State Library. 

This was organised by Mark Tredenik and many poets got up and read Robert’s poetry. Sadly Robert is no longer able to attend functions.

 

Botanical Garden amble

                                                                

Concert with David Helkgott at the Avoca Theatre.

My friend offered us the tickets because she was unable to attend and so we drove up the coast after lunch shared with the Northerleigh group. It was an uplifting afternoon.

 

 

 

Spring Ginko with White Pebbles Haiku Meeting

colleen Bush walks, Finding Zen, Poetry , , ,

 

   

For our spring ginko White Pebbles haiku poets gathered at  Edogawa Gardens at the Gosford Regional Gallery and Arts Centre on a glorious warm Saturday morning,14th September, 2024. Present were  Beverley George, Maire Glacken, Michael Thorley, Marilyn Humbert and Colleen Keating with apologies from Samantha Sirimanne Hyde, Pip Griffin and Gwen Bitti  and Kent  Robinson.

The ducklings were not fluffy babies but teenagers  and defying their parents  who were trying to keep up for them.

 

We met in the Gallery’s cafe for a catch-up before a stroll through the gardens. Over coffee,  Beverley gave us each some leaves she had collected to share, including a very soft, smooth acacia gun-metal leaf and a lemon myrtle leaf. Both stimulated lots of conversation about texture, aroma, colour  shape and the patterns in the leaf,  It reminded us to walk slowly and pay attention. And she challenged us to return with a leaf haiku.

We strolled the garden, enjoying the apricity – the warmth of the sunshine on our backs, the scent and colours of the azaleas and the business of ducks and koi carp sharing the pond and water features of the gardens. The duckling were a highlight following children around after food. The white pebbled garden was simply but beautifully raked.

Then we gathered to share our thoughts and words.  Beverley said how happy she was to see so many White  Pebble haikuists being published in Echidna tracks and encouraged us all to send  haiku this month in for the next edition. We then shared  our haiku. We  making suggestions to improve our haiku  Next, we considered the haiku and images that had been gathered on the garden walk earlier. This proved an extremely productive exercise. Michael shared his new working haiku on a small coloured card which he distributed as a gift for us to keep. We all liked this idea and decided to bring copies of our work to hand around next time.  A few ideas that enriched  my days:

lemon-scented gum
we drink mugs of  billy tea 
by the campfire          

Colleen  Keating

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abstract art
pond wriggles with koi
around the ducks

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We concluded the White Pebbles Spring meeting 2024 with our hope to meet on the second Saturday 14th December for our Summer meeting.   (just a date to put in our new 2025 diaries when we get them –  our Autumn meeting  just for this one time will be on the third Saturday 15th  March  2025 )

still as a statue
a water dragon stops
and stills passers-by

 

Poetica Christi Press poetry competition results

colleen Poetry , , ,

Feeling very honoured to have my poetry acknowledged and affirmed in the Poetic Christi Press  Poetry Competition.

Unable to be at the Melbourne launch of the much anticipated Anthology

A New Day Dawns 

but look forward to receiving my copy of the Anthology very soon.

Fifth symphony     Highly commended

Colleen Keating

Vaughan Williams
composed his symphony
on fire-watch

barrages of bombs dropped
nightly enflamed his city
no air raid shelter

for him as he pocketed
his note pad and pen
fought in the crucible

of siren-moans
cries for help
and from the dark

composed music that plays
like a mountain brook
tumbling

in a moment
that brims
with a tomorrow

And to be included in a new Anthology  called

A NEW DAY DAWNS

an anthology of poems

edited

by Janette Fernando

WINNERS OF THE 2024 COMPETITION –

A new day dawns

Poetica Christi Press poetry Competition 2024

Judge: Winner:

Tru Dowling
Wild With Scrub – Ellen Shelley

Runner-up:
Highly Commended: Fifth Symphony – Colleen Keating
Highly Commended:A Cool September Eve – Ellen Shelley
High Jinx – Laurie Keim

Commended
Mulch – Cathy Altmann
A Saint in Cobalt & Ochre – David Terelinck
Tacet – Bethany Evans
My Light Not Spent – Denise Parker
Sunset in Geraldton – Michael Genoni
Bleeding Hearts – Kate O’Neil
What the Water Gave Me – Jemma van Loenen
The Morning Star Guides Me On – Scott-Patrick Mitchell
Oriental Travel Trilogy – Stefan Dubczuk
Herm Island, Channel Islands, September 2023 –
Mary Jones Not About Dancing – Wendy Fleming
Sonnet – a Feather – Mocco Wollert
John – Claire Watson
Let’s Do It – Edith Speers
Janus-faced – Jason Beale
Polynesia, le ciel – Colleen Keating
Homecoming –Suzette Thompson
Blue-eyed Boy – Kay Cairns
On the Cusp of Morning – Claire Watson
Every Day I Wake – Janeen Samuel
Awakened – Wendy Fleming

My second poem Commended and to be published I will share her too

Polynesia, le ciel

Colleen Keating

It’s not ‘brothers, we must die,’ it is rather, ‘brothers, we must live’*

about light and colour he was never wrong
Henri Matisse knew from his youth
their startling wonder
how they exude a lighthouse authority
how they uplift human nature
when the world weighs low
and how when clouds of war
dim the sun
their illumination of hope can be forgotten
as in deepest night
it is easy to forget dawn returns

in Matisse’s Le Ciel
the lightness of joy fills the air
with a patchwork of his blues –
light and dark
alternating in and out
his cut-out sculptures of birds
float on the air
lift up dive whirl spin
ethereal in white
and dancing stars glint like enamel
or they could be flowers of joy
bordered by acanthus leaves
swaying hypnotically
reminding us to live

*H. Matisse (1946)

 

WINNERS-OF-THE-2024-COMPETITION-A-new-day-dawns

Launch of Tintinnabulum by Judith Beveridge

colleen General, Poetry , , ,

Tintinnabulum  by Judith Beveridge

Tintinnabulum was launched by poet Audrey Molloy at Gleebooks on  a delightful warm winters Sunday afternoon. 25th August  2024.

It was done in a conversational mode. Audrey’s questions helped Judith to open up about her writing .

Firstly the title. Judith explained, it is always difficult to come up with an interesting title. 

Tintinnabulum  means ‘little bell’ in Medieval Latin . As a verb it refers to a  ring or sound like a small bell,  peal, ring, sound sonorously . eg the tintinnabulation of wind chimes blowing in the breeze. or I always look forward to the joyous tintinnabulation at church during the christmas season. 

Judith makes a list of possible names for a title and slowly narrows it down.  In this book she explores what poetry can uncover through musicality and analogy  and how these elements can open up sacred space . The title Tintinnabulum is an onamatopeia word ( the naming of a thing or action by imitation  of natural sounds as buzz or hiss ) and that title became the final choice as one or two poems include that word .  Robert Frost says, ‘sound is the gold in the ore of poetry’ 

“I chose the title meaning ringing of little bells  to suggest celebration and to indicate that many poems in the collection,  engage in almost ritualised observance of precise aspects of the physical world . 

Judith would like to be called an imagist poet.

In this book she looks specially at animals, landscape and at people in certain environments.” 

Sacred space comes into being  with the idea of relationships and the idea of apprehending the interconnections  with  them especially  through the use of metaphor. 

Walking with the poet  captures this.  A poem in memory of Dorothy Porter.  She often uses water landscape . Rilke says ‘praising is what matters ‘

Judith is interested in the ways which simile and metaphors can create relations that previously might have been unnoticed. 

“My poetry centres around this core aspect of poetic language. ‘

She has been influenced  by Seamus Heaney , Robert Frost, Hopkins, Amie Clapton , Walcott, Plath . 

Sound

Sound affects the  reader  – when it hits our gut our feeling centre. For a poet  human emotions are full of potential. 

Love the sound of Plath  “A bird flits nimble-winged in thickets”  Sound is a great tool to get feelings rippling through the poem.  

Using poetic devices to give surprise and visceral response

Peppertree Bay  is pure adventure using metaphor, simile and imagination.  They are tools to connect  – dissolve boundaries to connect things in our gut  – healing, restoring,  and helping to open up sacred spaces .Pictures in your head she wants them to curl into your imagination and stay.  eg Breakwall octopus and ballet shoe, 

a kite letting down . . .  

A writer needs to balance imagination and reality.  

“You can have an imaginative garden but you need real toads in it” 

The poem The Light on Marine Bay  began with something real. Light on water at North Parramatta Park !

James Dickey says it is alright to lie in poetry  . It is a literary strategy to delve deeper into deeper truth . 

Empathy  

is an important quality. eg Cruelty of animals is appalling 

However sentimentality  can undermine the real feeling of a poem .  and sentimentality can be caused by a lack of attention.   Read The Dancing Elephant  There is an iron bell resonance between the animal and reader. 

Attentiveness is the natural prayer of the soul.

Assonance 

She loves Wallace Stevens  and works with his poetry in one section. 

His poems Snowman and 13 Ways to look at a Black Birds.

“One must resist the intellect almost obsessively . Forget the context, get the music . Failed poetry is when the content takes over. 

 

JUDITH SIGNING MY BOOK > I BELIEVE SHE IS ONE OF OUR GREAT LIVING AUSTRALIAN POETS .

 

Judith Beveridge: a note on Tintinnabulum

The renowned Australian poet Judith Beveridge reflects on her much-anticipated new collection of poems Tintinnabulum (1 July 2024), the first since her prize-winning Sun Music in 2018. Read an extract from the book here.

Tintinnabulum explores what poetry can uncover through musicality and analogy, how these elements can open up sacred spaces. I have chosen Tintinnabulum as the title (which means the ringing of little bells) to suggest celebration and to indicate that many poems in the collection engage in an almost ritualised observance of precise aspects of the physical world. I look specifically at animals, landscapes, and at people in certain environments.

Sacred spaces, I believe, come into being when we perceive relationships and apprehend interconnections. I have always been interested in the ways in which similes and metaphors can create relations that formerly might have been unnoticed. My poetry has centred around this core aspect of poetic language and Tintinnabulum continues this with perhaps more urgency and power, but also with humour and surprise.

I also love to use language that is distinctly focussed on sound as a way of enhancing meaning and providing pleasure for the reader. My animal poems, which make up the book’s first section, delve into how we often interact with cruelty and insensitivity to non-human animals, but I also look at ways in which encounters with animals throw their ‘otherness’ into stark relief such as the distinctly alien lives of cicadas, leeches, bluebottles.

The second section focusses on the human world and brings to bear a sense of compassion for the difficulties that people encounter: surfers on a high sea, a waitress unhappy in her job, two brothers suffering racist cruelty, as well as elegiac poems about friends and family members.

The third section consists of imaginative/hallucinogenic scenarios, and is my most poetry at its most weirdly inventive. This section culminates in a joyous romp through sonic repetitions and is a homage to the poetry of Wallace Stevens.

The poet Edward Hirsch has said that ‘Attentiveness is the natural prayer of the soul.’ I believe the final section of the book attempts this level of worshipful attention evoking the beauty and awe to be found in landscapes. It is my aim that readers, after reading Tintinnabulum, will find the world less fragmented and more interconnected, that language can be felt as an activating mechanism for wonder, joy and revelation.

— Judith Beveridge, May 2024