Azure

 

Surely a piece is

missing from the azure robe

of the Madonna

in some ancient mosaic

because of that fairy wren!

 

© Andrew Lansdown

Voicebox is a monthly poetry reading run by Josephine Clarke at the Tropicana Cafe in High Street (near the Victoria Hall), Fremantle. The readings start at 7.30 pm.

Andrew will read from his new collection of poetry, Birds in Mind. Come and hear him!

If I were to prepare an alphabetical list of Australian poets who are outstanding and whose first books have been published since 1980, my list would be ridiculously long. It would have to include Judith Beveridge, Kevin Brophy, Elizabeth Campbell, Caroline Caddy, Jennifer Compton, Tricia Dearborn, Stephen Edgar, Peter Goldsworthy, Philip Hodgins, Carol Jenkins, Andrew Lansdown, Anthony Lawrence, Bronwyn Lea, Emma Lew, Stephen McInerney, Homer Reith, Gig Ryan, Philip Salom, Andrew Sant, Shen, Craig Sherborne and Alex Skovron. Some of these poets are very different from each other and might look askance at their bedfellows. But all have written memorable and exciting poems. 

Quoted from “New poets mine rich seam of language”, Geoffrey Lehmann, The Australian, 21 February 2009 (emphasis added)

Sighting

On visiting the Bull Ranges with a traditional landowner

 

Pluck out the detecting eye,

break off the pointing finger,

shut up the exclaiming cry—

if only somehow I could!

 

But it’s too late to stifle

myself now or stop my friend,

who snatches up his rifle

and follows swiftly after

 

the wallabies I sighted,

the small wild rock wallabies

whose survival I blighted

simply because I saw them

 

and cried aloud, delighted.

            © Andrew Lansdown

I was pleased to receive an invitation by the Katharine Susannah Prichard Foundation to judge the Karen W Treanor Poetry Awards. Given that this is the inauguration of the Awards, I felt doubly honoured to be entrusted with this responsibility. My thanks to Fay Dease, Glen Philips, Paula Jones, Katrin Kuenstler and others involved with by the Katharine Susannah Prichard Foundation.

      Sixty-nine poems were entered in the Karen W Treanor Poetry Awards, which is a good number for a new competition. As is to be expected, the poems varied greatly in subject, theme, style and tone. Although the quality of the poems was uneven, most were cogent and accessible. This is praiseworthy in an age when pretension and ambiguity are often passed off as profundity.

      Before commenting on the winning and commended poems, I would like to make a comment on the submissions generally. I noticed several faults reoccurring in the poems and it may be helpful to mention two of these faults.

      The first fault involves the use of clichés. … CLICK HERE TO READ ANDREW’S FULL REPORT 

I was very touched, and of course honoured, when Andrew Lansdown asked me to launch his wonderful collection of poems, Birds in Mind: Australian Nature Poems. Ours has been a long acquaintance and friendship, going back to the mid-1970s or so. For a while, we were always the youngest WA poets to appear in anthologies such as Quarry, edited by Fay Zwicky in 1981. And I note that several of our near contemporaries in that anthology have gone on to either better or worse things, but Andrew and I have somehow managed to stay in the poetry-writing business.

Initially, there are several things to note about Birds in Mind. Firstly, the sheer size and scope of the subject matter. The joy in birds is apparent from the title, but they are only some of the creatures and plants the poet celebrates and sometimes mourns. You will also find superbly spare descriptions of, and reactions to, shells, frogs, lizards, kangaroos, crabs, fish, sunflowers, bamboo, orchids, trees in abundance—karri, jarrah, marri, redgum—and much, much more.

Another initial observation concerns the variety of places in which these poems have been published—they have obviously appealed to many different editors, and the Acknowledgements page is really mind-boggling. Apart from appearing in countless Australian journals and anthologies, many have been published overseas, in Japan, the USA, the UK.

A third observation is in regard to the quality of the book’s production itself and the generous 223 pages—no “slim” volume of verse this! … CLICK HERE TO READ FULL ADDRESS

Andrew has a new collection of poetry coming out next week.

Birds in Mind: Australian Nature Poems will be launched by the eminent Western Australian poet and critic, Shane McCauley.

Published by Queensland publisher Wombat Books, Birds in Mind contains over 200 pages of nature poetry.

If you live in Perth, Western Australia, you are welcome to come to the launching of Birds in Mind. 

Venue: Morley Baptist Church hall, Vera Street, Morley

Date: Saturday, 24 October 2009

Time: 3.00 pm

Andrew’s new chapbooks are cheaper than birthday cards or thinking-of-you cards - and yet the texts are immensely richer. Consolations is a 28 page collection of 48 tanka and Little Matters is a 24 page collection of 89 haiku and senryu. Both cost just $3.60, postage included. So why not send a chapbook instead of a card to those you are thinking of?

Consolations, and Little Matters are available through this website - click here. Or they can be ordered through the publishers website at www.picaropress.com.