Australian Poetry Ltd has produced a second edition  of Dear Dad, which includes a poem, “In from the Garden”, by Andrew.

Celebrating dads,  this anthology makes an attractive alternative to the average Father’s Day card. It includes fine poems about dads from poets across the country. This is the second and final edition of Dear Dad.

The second edition features a new original  cover design by Melbourne artists Gracia & Louise.

Order copies of Dear Dad from the Australian Poetry website here.

The Fremantle Press launch Two Poets was a great success.

The book contains Andrew’s latest collection, The Colour of Life, which consists of 97 poems, most of them previously uncollected. The other collection in the book is Songs Sul G by Kevin Gillam.

View photographs of the launching on the Fremantle Press website here.

Read sample poems from Two Poets here and here.

Fremantle Press has posted media information about Two Poets here.

Purchase Two Poets throught the Fremantle Press website here.

The West Australian newspaper has a pre-launching article about Two Poets on its website here.

Photograph (above) courtesy Fremantle Press:

Fremantle Press has invited Andrew to co-judge its tanka competition. The other judge is Wendy Jenkins. Read the competition details on the Fremantle Press blogsite here: http://www.fremantlepress.blogspot.com/

To assist entrants, Fremantle Press asked Andrew to write an overview of the tanka, its history and formal requirements. Andrew’s short essay has been posted on the Fremantle Press blogsite and is reproduced here:

Talking about Tanka

by Andrew Lansdown

The tanka is a poetic form with a long and rich history. It originated in Japan in the sixth or seventh century and quickly became that nation’s dominant poetic from. The first national poetry anthology, Man’yoshu, compiled in the eighth century, contains 4,500 poems, of which 4,200 are tanka. The 21 imperial anthologies compiled between 905 and 1439 contain over 33,600 tanka.

The Japanese word “tanka” means “short poem” or “short song”. True to its name, a tanka is a short poem consisting of five lines and 31 syllables. The lines are measured by syllables and form a pattern of 5-7-5-7-7 syllables respectively.

Arrangement of lines by syllables is a key feature of the tanka and this feature can be reproduced as effectively in the English language as in the Japanese. The 5-7-5-7-7 syllabic structure guides the phrasing of the poem and lends balance to not only the individual lines but also the poem itself. … [READ MORE – https://andrewlansdown.com/poetry/poetry-collections/consolations/]

The Books Editor of the West Australian newspaper, William Yeoman, interviewed Andrew and three other poets whose books will be released by Fremantle Press this week.

Excerpts of the interviews appeared in an article titled “Collections of verse sung in a human key” in the West Australian on Tuesday, 5 July (“Today” section, page 7).

Read the full article here: http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/entertainment/a/-/arts/9786754/collections-of-verse-in-a-human-key/

Photograph (by Simon Santi for the West Australian) from left to right: Andrew Lansdown, Kevin Gillam & Michael Heald

The June issue of Quadrant contains Andrew’s poem “Being Bamboo”. You can read it on the Quadrant website: https://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/6/being-bamboo

Andrew has been invited to read at the Perth Poetry Club on Saturday, 9 July. Come and hear him read poems from his latest collection, The Colour of Life in Two Poets (Fremantle Press, 2011).

The Perth Poetry Club meets at the Moon Cafe in William Street, Northbridge, on Saturdays between 2.00 – 4.00 pm.

Dave Osborne recently requested permission to use some of Andrew’s poems on his WalkGPS website, which is dedicated to bushwalking in the Perth (WA) region. He has now posted two of Andrew’s poems – “Desertion” and “Tanka”. To read them, follow the links in the 7 June 2011 “What’s New” entry at http://www.walkgps.com/what’s{622e8f302d1fb91812edd8a3c16e0696cd1f0e82e697b7a9609cca725af619bb}20new.htm  While there, take a cyberwalk through the site: it is quite impressive.

Quadrant magazine has published five of Andrew’s poems in its May 2011 issue. One of the five is a gunsaku, “Seven Birds”, consisting of seven tanka. The first of the seven bird tanka is written in slant (half) rhyme and reads:

Bird and Bull

 

The dotterel,

stalking, sniping—so little

by the muzzle

and muddy hoof of the bull

drinking at the dam’s puddle.

          © Andrew Lansdown

Read the remaining six tanka in “Seven Birds” on the Quadrant website: http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/5/seven-birds

Andrew’s other poems can also be read on the Quadrant website:

“In Dependence” –

http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/5/in-dependence

“Wheatbelt Willy-Willy” and “The Gravity of the Slight” –

http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/5/two-poems

“Spores” –

http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/5/seven-birds

The City of Armadale is hosting a Getting the Word Out Poetry Evening on Tuesday 24th May, 6.30 – 8.30 pm. Andrew is one of several poets invited to read for the event. Admission is free and all are welcome.

Peter Cowan Writers’ Centre (PCWC) is running a series of 10 Advanced Poetry Workshops throughout 2011.

Andrew is one of nine professional poets invited to be a facilitator for one of the workshops. Other facilitators include Shane McCauley, Lucy Dougan, Andrew Burke and Dennis Haskell.

The Advanced Poetry Workshops are a new initiative by PCWC aimed at assisting already accomplished poets to move to a new level of achievement.

Last year, applicants had to submit five recent poems to PCWC, to be assessed by Professor Andrew Taylor (who initiated the Workshops and is also one of the facilitators). Twelve poets were chosen from over 30 applicants to attend 10 sessions on the second Saturday of each month from February to November.

Andrew’s workshop will take place on Saturday 14th May and will cover “Alternative Poetic Forms”. The synopsis of his workshop reads:

TS Eliot claimed that one poet is superior to another primarily on the basis of his or her critical faculties. Writing in traditional poetic forms supports and strengthens our critical faculties by providing objective guidance and goals. It also enhances our creativity by prompting us to think in ways that are new to us. This workshop will focus primarily on the traditional Japanese poetic forms of haiku, gunsaku, tanka and choka, all of which are conducive to contemporary descriptive, reflective and imagist poetry.

The Canadian poet, D.S. Martin has posted a brief biographical note about Andrew, accompanied by 3 of Andrew’s poems, on his site, Kingdom Poets. See it at: http://kingdompoets.blogspot.com/2011/05/andrew-lansdown.html

Writing in Island magazine, the Australian poet John Jenkins recently made the following observations about Andrew and his poem “Leaf and Load”:

Andrew Lansdown struck me, too, as being particularly gracious to his fellow readers. Sympathetic and sensitive, he was always interested in how a poem someone read came about, its inspiration and means; its sources and resources. He had an acute ear and was, clearly, a marvellous listener. He showed me a poem of his, “Leaf and Load”, which I have used in creative writing workshops: a model of direct observation, about a leaf which bends under the weight of a swollen droplet of water during a storm. It is simple, yet exquisite, Zen-like in its clarity and attention to detail. For a second, this poem communicates what we know to be impossible: the direct apprehension of subject matter—a leaf bowed by a rain-drop—somehow unmediated by poet, poem or language; as if artifice could simply erase itself, leaving only the presence of reality. In my opinion, Lansdown remains the doyen, in Australia, of this sort of exquisite, small-scale, nature poem. Easy to attempt, devilishly hard to do!

This is an excerpt from John Jenkins’ recollections of the Tasmanian Poetry Festival in 1994, written to celebrate the Festival’s 25th anniversary, and published as part of a multi-part essay, “Written in Silver: The Tasmanian Poetry Festival”, published in Island, No. 121, Winter 2010, pp. 50-51.

The poem, “Leaf and Load”, to which John Jenkins refers is:

Leaf and Load

 

The rain is breaking its phials

on the ornamental plum. From

the verandah I choose a leaf,

 

glistening with wet, and watch

until each vein becomes a rill

running into the midrib-river

 

and on to the leaf’s tip

where the waters gather in a blister

to weight the leaf downwards

 

by imperceptible degrees. Slipping

from the chlorophyll plane, the rain-

drop hangs from the leaf-tip

 

as a ball-bearing might hang

from the point of a magnet, held

by the barest contact between

 

curve and cusp. Like a miniature

transparent balloon tied by a child

to a tap, the drop swells,

 

bulges with a fragile elasticity,

bowing the leaf with its growing load,

until loosed at last by gravity.

 

Released, the leaf leaps up,

shudders to an easy equilibrium

in the light, impacting rain.

           © Andrew Lansdown

First published in the literary magazine Westerly, “Leaf and Load” is included in Andrew’s poetry collections The Grasshopper Heart (1991) and Birds in Mind (2009).

Wombat Books has arranged a launching for Andrew’s new collection of children’s poetry, Allsorts: poetry tricks and treats.

The launching will take place at 6.30 pm on Saturday, 9th April in the hall of the Morley Baptist Church in Vera Street, Morley.

It’s late notice, but all who appreciate Andrew’s poetry are most welcome to attend.

Many years ago Andrew published a selection of 18 poems by William Hart-Smith in Artlook magazine. That selection, along with Andrew’s introductory essay, has now been posted on this website. Read Hart-Smith’s superb poems here.

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Eminent Australian poet Geoff Page has given Andrew permission to use some poetry critiques from his book, 80 Great Poems from Chaucer to Now (UNSW Press, 2006).

Six of Geoff’s critiques have been posted on this website so far. They can be read here:

T.S. Eliot, “Journey of the Magi” –

https://andrewlansdown.com/favourite-poems/ts-eliot/

Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Carrion Comfort” –

https://andrewlansdown.com/favourite-poems/gerard-manley-hopkins/

James McAuley, “Because” –

https://andrewlansdown.com/favourite-poems/james-mcauley/

William Carlos Williams, “This is Just to Say” –

https://andrewlansdown.com/favourite-poems/william-carlos-williams/

King David, “Psalm 23” –

https://andrewlansdown.com/favourite-poems/david-king-of-israel/

Les Murray, “The Mitchells” –

https://andrewlansdown.com/favourite-poems/les-murray/

*  *  *  *  *  *

Also, read nine of Geoff’s poems on Andrew’s website here:

https://andrewlansdown.com/fellow-writers/geoff-page/

Quadrant magazine has published Andrew’s gunsaku “Black” in its March 2011 issue. You can read the four-haiku sequence on the Quadrant website at http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/3/black

Later this year, Fremantle Press will release a collection of Andrew’s poetry in a book titled Two Poets.

Famous Reporter 42 has published three of Andrew’s haiku. Here’s the first one:

A dilemma—

two pretty women walking

opposite ways.

        © Andrew Lansdown

Captivated! has published Andrew’s poem “Beliefs about Ibises” in its February 2011 issue.

Meanjin has published Andrew’s poem “Wren Haiku” in its Autumn 2011 (Vol. 70, No.1) issue.

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Wombat Books has published a new collection of poetry by Andrew titled Allsorts: poetry tricks and treats.

The book contains nature, narrative, fantasy and humorous poems in free verse, rhymed verse, limercks, haiku, ballads and sonnets.

The final 70 pages of Allsorts include personal observations from the poet about the poems in the collection, lesson/writing suggestions for students and aspiring poets, a comprehensive glossary of poetic forms and techniques, and a set of seven indexes identifying the poems that employ these different forms and techniques.

The collection is delightfully illustrated by the poet’s wife, Susan Lansdown.

Click here (or on the book cover) to read publication details and sample poems.

Click here to order a copy of the book.

Quadrant magazine has published Andrew’s “Tanka about Pain” in its January-February 2011 issue. You can read the four-tanka sequence on the Quadrant website at http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/1/tanka-about-pain