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Two of Andrew’s poems have been published in the new Brandl & Schlesinger anthology, Falling an Flying: Poems on Ageing. The editors, Susan Ogle and Judith Beveridge, chose Andrew’s poems “Meditations on Pain” and “Us2″ for inclusion.

On their website (http://brandl.com.au/recent-titles/falling-and-flying), the publishers state:

Falling and Flying: Poems on Ageing – is the first collection of its kind to be published in Australia.  The editors have selected a broad range of Australian poems which explore the universal experience and effects of ageing.  Whether the poets are witnessing themselves or their parents and friends succumb to the years, they speak with great precision and insight into illness, frailty, death, loss, grief and retirement as well as the joys and the wisdom that late maturity can bring.  There is humour as well as sadness in this fine and important collection, which includes the work of some of Australia’s best loved poets, a volume to be cherished by readers of any age.

Dr Susan Ogle is a Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine and geriatrician at Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney and has recently completed a Masters of Medical Humanities.  Susan has been interested in medical education for many years, using literature (stories and poetry), patient and family narratives and role play.  She is co-editor of Reflection, the humanities section of the Australasian Journal on Ageing.  Her poetry has been  published in literary and medical journals.

Judith Beveridge is the author of six volumes of poetry, most recently Devadatta’s Poems and Hook and Eye.  She is the poetry editor of Meanjin and teaches poetry writing at postgraduate level at the University of Sydney.  She has won many prizes for her poetry including the Philip Hodgins Memorial Medal and the Christopher Brennan Award.  Her work has been studied in schools and universities and has been translated into several languages.

Poetry | Published November 2015

ISBN: 978-1-921556-87-6 pb

RRP: $29.95

The New Zealand journal, Valley Micropress, published one of Andrew’s poem in its November/December 2015 (Vol. 18, No. 10) issue. The poem, “Forgetting-Grass” (not to be confused with Andrew’s poem of the same name published in The Weekend Australian newspaper in January 2015), was first published under the title “The Forgetting-Grass Enigma” in the January-February issue of Quadrant magazine.

The Mozzie published one of Andrew’s poems, a tanka titled “Conformity” (although the title was inexplicably missing!), in its November 2015 issue.

Andrew’s poem, “The Bamboo Dragonflies of Arashiyama”, was published in the November 2015 issue of Quadrant magazine. It can be read on the quadrant site at https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2015/11/andrew-lansdown-bamboo-dragonflies-arashiyama/

Two of Andrew’s poems were published in the October 2015 issue of Quadrant. Both poems — “Visiting Basho’s Grave” and “In the Gardens of the Imperial Palace” – are gunsaku (haiku sequences) and can be read on the Quadrant site at https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2015/10/andrew-lansdown-two-poems-5/

Andrew will read at the WA launch of the Inkerman & Blunt anthology, Prayers of a Secular World.

The Mayor of Fremantle, Brad Pettitt, will launch the book on behalf of the publishers on Saturday, 24th October, at 4.00 pm, in the Back room of the Bar Orient Hotel, 39 High St Fremantle.

Andrew is represented in the anthology with the poem, “Forgetting”, and this is the poem he will read at the launch.

Everyone is welcome!

Andrew is one of the poets represented in the latest anthology by publishers Inkerman & Blunt.

Prayers of a Secular World is edited by Jordie Albiston and Kevin Brophy and contains 100 poems by new and established Australian poets.

Andrew’s poem in the anthology is “Forgetting”. It was published earlier in the year by The Weekend Australian Review with the title “Forgetting-Grass”. (For the text of the poem, see the 5th January 2015 entry, “Poem in Weekend Australian Review”, on the home page of this website.)

Six of Andrew’s poems have been published in the October 2015 issue of FreeXpresSion magazine. The poems have been reprinted from Andrew’s books, Gestures of Love: The Fatherhood Poems (Wombat Books, 2013) and Inadvertent Things: Poems in traditional Japanese forms (Walleah Press, 2013).

One of the poems taken from Gestures of Love is “The Tanka of the Imperial Courts”, a love poem for the poet’s wife, Susan. An earlier version of this poem was published in Andrew’s book Waking and Always (Angus & Robertson Publishers, 1987). Andrew rewrote “The Tanka of the Imperial Courts” for the second edition of Waking and Always, published by Picaro Press (Warners Bay, NSW) in 2008. Whereas the original poem was written in free verse, the revised poem is written in four tanka-stanzas, which is to say, each stanza is structured like a tanka, with 31 syllables arranged in lines of 5, 7, 5, 7, 7 syllables. While the integrity of the original poem has been preserved, it has been refined and intensified by this revising and restructuring. The new version of the poem, most recently published in FreeXpresSion, is reprinted below:

The Tanka of the Imperial Courts

 

The ancient tanka

of Japan are quite imbued

with love and longing.

And reading them at tea break

filled me with yearning for you.

 

Through the weariness

of the day’s working I thought

of my years with you,

the many swift flowing years

of our courtship and marriage.

 

Remember, my love,

after our first lovemaking,

the swallows winging

about us as we swam down

the slow dark river at dusk?

 

In celebration

of our honeymoon—hundreds

of welcome swallows

skimming the water, kissing

their reflection as they drank!

© Andrew Lansdown

The Canberra Times newspaper published Andrew’s poem “Notch” on 15th August 2015.

On 31st August Andrew addressed the Retired Teachers’ Association. He spoke about his writing generally and read from his children’s poetry collection, Allsorts.

In September he co-judged the Spoken Worship Brisbane Poetry Competition, the winners of which were announced at a ceremony on 10th October at the Anglican Cathedral, Brisbane.

The last two issues of The Mozzie magazine have published poems by Andrew. The July 2015 issue contains his poem “Forgetting-Grass”, while the August 2015 issue contains his poem “Of Petals and Poets”.

Five of Andrew’s poems have been published in the July-August 2015 issue of Quadrant. They are “The Small Souls”, “Memories of War”, “Of Petals and Poets”, “Nothing” and “Wasp and Water”.

The poem “Of Petals and Poets” is from Andrew’s forthcoming collection of poems and photographs, provisionally titled Kyoto Sakura Tanka. The poems in this new collection, which will be published by Wombat Books, are all tanka (or, to use an older designation, waka), which is appropriate for a collection of poems (along with photographs) set in Kyoto in spring and focusing on Japan’s renowned cherry blossoms.

Of Petals and Poets

Kyoto Spring

 

The waka poets

weighted the cherry petals

with sad sentiment …

Nonetheless they sail the air

as if unburdened with care.

 

               © Andrew Lansdown

Andrew has been invited to read at the Perth Poetry Club on Saturday 20th June at 2.00 pm.

Read details about his scheduled reading here: http://www.perthpoetryclub.com/saturday-20th-june-andrew-lansdown

The Perth Poetry Club meets at the Moon Café at 323 Williams Street, Northbridge, from 2.00 to 4.00 every Saturday afternoon.

View the Perth Poetry Club’s website here: http://www.perthpoetryclub.com/

Here is Andrew’s speech launching Shane McCauley’s book, Trickster, on Saturday afternoon, 6th June 2015:

Launching Speech: Shane McCauley’s Trickster

I am deeply honoured to have been invited by Shane to launch his latest collection of poetry, Trickster.

I want to begin my launching speech with a few facts about Shane McCauley, the poet.

• Shane began writing poetry in 1971.
• His first poem was published in Westerly magazine in 1974.
• Since then, Shane has had more than a thousand poems, stories, articles and reviews published in journals and anthologies in Australia and overseas.
• He has won many major literary awards, including the Tom Collins Poetry Prize, the Poetry Australia Bicentennial Poetry Award, the Max Harris Poetry Award, the Poetry d’Amour Prize and the Glen Phillips Poetry Prize.
• He has had eight books of poetry published, including The Drunken Elk by Sunline Press in 2010, Ghost Catcher by Studio Press in 2012, and now Trickster by Walleah Press in 2015.

This brief overview shows that Shane is a poetry stalwart. In the 1970s, 80s and 90s many people aspired to be poets, published a few poems, even won a few awards, then disappeared from the poetry scene. But Shane has remained true to the calling of the poet for forty years!  He is a serious poet with serious achievement to match.

Shane’s eighth and latest book, Trickster, is further proof of his poetical prowess. And, of course, this book is the reason we have come together this afternoon. We have gathered to celebrate the publication of Trickster and to wish it bon voyage—good journey!—as it sets sail into the world.

Click here to read the entire speech

Andrew’s speech can also be read on the Walleah Press website here: http://walleahpress.com.au/Lansdown.html

Andrew launched Shane McCauley’s latest poetry collection, Trickster, at the Fremantle Arts Centre on Saturday, 6th June. Shane McCauley is a widely published and highly respected Western Australian poet. Trickster is his collection of poetry and is published by Walleah Press (Tasmania).

[Andrew Lansdown delivering his launching speech for Trickster]

Over 100 people attended the launching, including well-known poets Fay Zwicky, Dennis Haskell, Roland Leach, Kevin Gillam, Annamaria Weldon, Tracy Ryan and John Kinsella.

To top off a marvellous gathering, 75 copies of Trickster were sold, which is an outstanding achievement at a poetry book launching!

The three photographs posted here were taken by Andrew’s wife, Susan and are used by her kind permission.

[Above and below: Shane McCauley reading from Trickster at the launching]

Four of Andrew’s poems have been published in in the latest edition (No. 5) of Regime: A Magazine of New Writing.

The publishers, Regime Books, state:

Announcing with pleasure Regime 05, The Poetry Issue, which has been edited by renowned poet and Regime Contributing Editor Andrew Burke.

We’re proud to present a collection of the best contemporary poetry and poets currently at work in the world. In this latest issue of Regime, you will find new work from Andrew Taylor, Andy Jackson, Annamaria Weldon, Jill Jones, Judith Rodriguez, Geoff Page, Amanda Joy and Andrew Lansdown.

Andrew’s poems in this latest issue of Regime are “Concerning the Perils of Cherry Petals” (a 5-haiku gunsaku), “Gazing at a Geisha”, “The Stilt’s Sobriquet” and “Family Restaurant Tanka” (a 4-tanka gunsaku).

The fourth tanka in “Family Restaurant Tanka” is titled “Conformity” and is reproduced below:

Conformity

 

‘Don’t step on the lines!’

Being used to being obeyed,

the child does not check

behind to observe with what care

her mother follows, square on square.

© Andrew Lansdown

Read more details about Regime No. 5 on the publisher’s website here: http://www.regimebooks.com.au/regime-05-magazine-of-new-writing/

Copies of Regime No. 5 can be purchased from the Book Depository, here http://www.bookdepository.com/Regime-05-Magazine-New-Writing/9780987482150

The June 2015 issue of Quadrant contains Andrew’s poem “Silver Pendant”, which consists of three tanka, “Fallen”, “Assumption” and “Lost”. Quadrant has accepted a further five poems from Andrew for publication later this year.

Andrew will launch Shane McCauley’s new book, Trickster, on Saturday 6th June. Trickster is Shane’s eighth book of poetry and is published by Walleah Press in Tasmania.

The launch will take place in the Pavlich Room of the Fremantle Arts Centre (1 Finnerty Street, Fremantle) on Saturday 6th June at 2pm.

Come and hear Andrew. More importantly, meet Shane and hear him read from his new collection. Copies of Trickster will be on sale for $20.

Several poems from Trickster will be posted on this website in the near future. In the meantime, you can read poems from Shane’s other books here: https://andrewlansdown.com/fellow-writers/shane-mccauley/

Three of Andrew’s poems have been published in the March 2015 issue of Quadrant. They are “Water for Worship”, “Petals Scattering” and “The Man with the Gun”. The poem “Water for Worship” is a choka (a traditional Japanese poetic form involving alternating lines of 5 and 7 syllables and concluding on two lines of 7 syllables each) and was written after a stay in Osaka, Japan:

Water for Worship

Osaka, Japan

 

At Hozen Temple

a stooped Japanese man is

working the handle

of a cast iron pump, which is

spouting water to

a plastic bucket in which

it will be carried,

sloshing, ten paces then poured

in a granite pot

from which it will be scooped with

a tin-cupped ladle

and tossed over a life-size

statue of Fudo,

the god of fire and wisdom,

covered now in moss

sustained by countless dousings

across the decades

from hopeful petitioners

like this very man

who is puffing while pumping

water for worship

as I write where I began

this poem at Hozen Temple.

               © Andrew Lansdown

The December 2014 issue of Quadrant contains two of Andrew’s poems – “Nijo Castle, Kyoto” and “Japanese Heron”. Each poem consists of three tanka. The third tanka of “Nijo Castle, Kyoto” is subtitled “The Interlocking Stones”:

The Interlocking Stones

 

Pieces of fretsaw-

cut plywood reassembled

to form a jigsaw–

that, in their neat interlock,

is the way the wall-stones look.

               © Andrew Lansdown

Andrew’s poem, “Forgetting-grass”, was published in the 3-4 January 2015 issue of The Weekend Australian Review. The same poem, under the simplified (and preferred) title “Forgetting”, is scheduled for publication later this year in the Inkerman & Blunt anthology, Prayers of a Secular World. It is reproduced below:

Forgetting-grass

‘I long to pick/ Some forgetting-grass’ –

Ki no Tsurayuki, The Tosa Diary, 935 AD

 

For you I need a different flower,

brother, than the blue forget-me-nots.

 

Oh, here in this world where you left me

I yearn for the sweet forgetting-grass

 

treasured by the ancient Japanese.

I want to search out and gather up

 

those grasses that take away grieving

by somehow infusing forgetting.

 

I want stooks of the stuff, large wigwam

stooks that can be shaken loose and strewn

 

to cover me with stalk, leaf and scent

from the loss of you and how you went.

© Andrew Lansdown

Two of Andrew’s poems have been published in the January-February 2015 issue of Quadrant. They are “The Forgetting-Grass Enigma” and “Walking to the Waterfall”. They can be read on the Quadrant website here: http://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2015/01-02/andrew-lansdown-two-poems-4/