I am a teacher and writer living in the foothills of Perth. My writing has been published in many Australian anthologies and online journals, as well as an audio piece for The Blood Orange Review, USA. Currently I am the chairperson of the Katharine Susannah Prichard Writers Centre, the oldest centre of its kind in Australia.
Discovery
/ you are a voyage begun years ago/ on smooth water/ blue-green like polished glass/ you are the curve of a small sailboat/ stretched to scoop the winds in your white canopy/ feel the heat of river stones/ see the summer sun caught in the greenness of leaves/ smell the deep ripening of frangipani flowers/ of figs/ soft strawberries in bowls/ your voyage/ begun years ago/ tossed you on a greyfoam shore/ sharp with flint and fire/ there you collected the oceans deep-blue gems/ stringing them around your throat/ through hot rains/ through tunnels of high wind/ headlands that jutted like bared teeth/ you continued to journey/ cut at your coconut flesh/ discarded the husk/ you arrive/ here/ this moment/ with your deep-sea eyes and overcast frown/ asking to be discovered/
it is at night
it is at night
these things happen
dark things
unalterable things
sucked from lip to ear
pressed skintight in the
half-light of the moon
outside the night is a woman
undressing
slipping black silk
from her cool shoulder
pressing oil scents
into her smooth temple
pulsing wrists
night is where you take me
on thick tapestries
threading fingers and tongue
discarding the heavy skirt of day
the church of your wet mouth
open to prayer
the holy light of your eyes
in side our pearl shell
underwater
night is spent
like an apple core
we fish for darkness
under messy covers
morning enters the room
like petals across a path
