March #4

The Point is the Light

We walk from the temple

after the feast,

down the hill to the car.

Navigating uneven ground, 

I catch a glint between stones: 

black sheen,

and a blue-green inky sliver.

A peacock's chest feather?

The splinter of colour

along its spine

flashes iridescent 

against the surrounding dark.

I turn it this way and that

between finger and thumb —

such a tiny thing —

watching the brightness 

move and spread.

My friend finds another,

rainbow stripes fanning

wide across the tip.

"They're both yours," she insists.

(Earlier, over dinner,

she helped fend off 

that oaf who tried to hit on me.)

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

March #3

Centre of Education.

A dot.

A point.

An exact location in space.

The place

pierced with a compass.

A pinhole.

Light bursts through.

A prism

refracts

the spectrum,

frees a rainbow,

and the point is the light.

— Michele Brenton

March #2

Learned To Assimilate

I refugee'd out of home to the school yard shore,

escaping solitude,

so I thought,

for a better way of life.

I learned that not everyone saw fairies,

or still had imaginary friends.

Soft ways were for the back yard

amongst the red glowing geraniums.

The asphalt of school met my hands and knees

as laughter held me down.

I hid my knowing,

drew a veil over my seeing eyes,

shut my truthful mouth,

and was led to
the detention centre of education.

— Helen Patrice

March #1

Their Song

Corellas?

They tell me of lost

country, of

stolen generations:

once in this town

they were thousands

now counted in dozens.

Silent Spring? Not yet

but soon.

I listen to their screaming

keenly, translate

their screeches into

my own outrage

my fear of stealth and story

that justifies theft.

Their community voice

pierces the certainty

of self-interest.

“Too many!”

“I hate that noise!”

“They destroy my orchard,

everything!”

“I hate them!”

Their dispatched  feathers –

fluffballs, quills, faintest

orange or lemon on white –

I stuff in my pocket.

Their views are aerial

and urgent; they shake

elm and eucalypt

with equal fervour

having careered across roads

and paths above

hostile tribes.

I prevent collected feathers

from drifting away.

It is that insistent

commentary, their claim

to country – unreconciled,

unrecognised – our ears

do not want to receive.

It is a wordless song

a treetop rant

we have never

learned to assimilate.

— Jennie Fraine