The National Library of Australia has just released the latest book in its Little Book of … series – Little Book of Banksias. The editors have included one of Andrew’s poems, “Banksia”, from his first poetry collection, Homecoming.

The back cover blurb for Little Book of Banksias states:

The banksia is quintessentially Australian. Known and loved for its brush-like flowers and sweet honey nectar, the plant embodies both the beauty and harshness of the Australian landscape.

Little Books of Banksias features poems and extracts by some of Australia’s greatest poets and explorers, including Dorothy Hewett, Archie Weller, Douglas Stewart and Edward John Eyre.  These insights sit alongside works by renowned artists, such as Ellis Rowan, Adam Forster and Ebenezer Edward Gostelow.  Inspired by the collections of the National Library of Australia, Little Book of Banksias is a delightful showcase of some of our most beautiful Australian ‘bush candles’.

Andrew’s poems also appear in three other books in the NLA series – Little Book of Butterflies, Little Book of Trees, Little Book of Cats. Another of Andrew’s poems has been selected for Little Book of Orchids, scheduled for publication later this year.

The January-February 2013 issue of Quadrant contains four of Andrew’s poems: “Sand-Bathing”, “Perceptions” and “Everlastings” and “Blues”.

The December 2012 issue of Quadrant magazine contains four of Andrew’s poems: “South”, “Away from Canada”, “Cynosure” and “Foul Play”. While all four poems can be read online only by Quadrant subscribers, the poem “South”, concerning the poet’s stay in the United States of America late last year, is reprinted below:

 

South

 

This is America and I don’t know

the birds or their migrations.

 

But I recognise this little gaggle,

this travelling trio, of Canada geese

 

grazing on the grass verge

of the hurtling eight-lane highway.

 

Such an unlikely place! Yet

they will not stay on the outskirts

 

of Chicago for long—they are

charting their way south for winter.

 

South—the same direction

as my home, the direction always

 

pulling at the loadstone of my heart.

                    © Andrew Lansdown

Quadrant magazine has published three of Andrew’s poems in its November 2012 issue – “The Solace of the Stilt”, “Sand-Bathing” and “Perceptions”.

Several of Andrew’s poems have been included in the latest issue of Axon journal – a series of four tanka under the title “Birds, Perching” and another tanka titled “Absence”.

Axon is a scholarly and non-commercial journal of creative practice and theory published under the auspices of the University of Canberra.

Andrew’s poems can be read on the Axon website here: http://www.axonjournal.com.au/issue-3/birds-perching-and-absence

Andrew’s poem “Who Gives This Woman” has been published in the latest edition of the beautifully produced, book-style magazine Famous Reporter (# 43, June 2012).

(For those who have access to the magazine, note that there is an error at the end of the fourth line of the second stanza: the word “fear” should in fact be “feel”.)

Earlier this year, the online journal Creatrix invited Andrew to submit several haiku for inclusion in a special “invitation only” section. Those haiku – three of them – have now been published in Creatrix, issue 17, June 2012.

One of Andrew’s haiku in Creatrix #17 is:

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Café verandah—

a housefly kamikazes

my cappuccino

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© Andrew Lansdown

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To read Andrew’s other two haiku, go to the Creatrix website: http://creatrix.wapoets.net.au/2012/06/issue-17-haiku/ and scroll down to the section headed “The following haiku are by special invitation from renowned national and international haikuists”.

The esteemed Australian poet and anthologist Les Murray has compiled a collection of the best poems published in Quadrant magazine in the last ten years.

Les Murray has included 12 of Andrew’s poems in the anthology, which is titled The Quadrant Book of Poetry 2001 – 2010 (ISBN 9780980677867).

“It has been known for decades”, Les Murray writes in his introduction to this collection, “that poets who might fear relegation or professional sabotage from the critical consensus of our culture have a welcome and a refuge in Quadrant—but only if they write well.”

From the second decade of his twenty years as literary editor of Quadrant, Les Murray here presents a selection of the best verse he published between 2001 and 2010.

It is a prodigious body of work: 487 poems by 169 authors.

These days, Murray observes, when poetic values are increasingly being seen as real enrichment, readers are turning to the few journals that nurture them:

“At a time of such turn-about in the life of magazines, a Quadrant anthology seems well overdue.”

Andrew’s poems in The Quadrant Book of Poetry 2001-2010 are: “Two Pictures of Hurt”, “After Pain”, “Dandelion Haiku”, “Distress”, “Wrens in Wire”, “Freedom”, “The Sleep of the Upright”, “Caress”, “Hop”, “Flag”, “Sighting”, “After Death”.

The poem “Freedom”, which is also published in Andrew’s latest collection, The Colour of Life (in Two Poets with Kevin Gillam, Fremantle Press 2011) is reproduced below:

Freedom

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How foolishly I once thought of freedom.

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When my first son was small I sometimes

dreamed of the day I’d be independent

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of his demands. At times the chores

of fatherhood hung upon me like chains.

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Now he is gone, gone to university, gone

from home—and I am enslaved by loss.

.

How foolishly I once thought of freedom.

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© Andrew Lansdown

Quadrant published Andrew’s poem “Women with Infants” in its January-February 2012 issue. The magazine also published Andrew’s poems “Seize the Day”, “Pink Tones” and “Stargazing” in its April 2012 issue. “Pink Tones” is reproduced below:

Pink Tones

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To the sporadic pull

of the air’s clear rope

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the hibiscus blossom

sways and swings

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but its pistil tongue

still cannot strike

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the wall of the bell,

which peals out

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not sound but colour.

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© Andrew Lansdown

The Canberra Times newspaper published two tanka by Andrew on 24 March 2012. Under the overarching heading “Outback Eagles”, the first tanka is titled “Prey”, while the second is titled “Poise”. The second is reproduced below:

2. Pose

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A wedgetail eagle

on a kangaroo carcass

beside the highway

strikes up a majestic pose

as if it had made the kill.

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© Andrew Lansdown