Poets Union Inc.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

In a speech to the audience before public readings from his collection 'Poet in New York' (first published in 1940) Federica Garcia Lorca insisted that

as a poet

"the first thing one must do is invoke the duende. This is the only way all of you will succeed at the hard task of understanding metaphors as soon as they arise, without depending on intelligence or on a critical apparatus, and be able to capture, as fast as it is read, the rhythmic design of the poem. For the quality of a poem can never be judged on just one reading, especially not poems like these which are full of what I call "poetic facts" that respond to a purely poetic logic and follow the constructs of emotion and of poetic architecture. Poems like these are not likely to be understood without the cordial help of the duende."

'Poet in New York' by Federico Garcia Lorca
(First published 1940) Penguin edition 1988.

Saturday, November 7, 2009

Poets Union Inc. now has a group on Facebook

As well as this Poets Union Inc. blog we have created a Poets Union Inc Facebook group.

The Poets Union Inc. blog and Poets Union Inc. group on Facebook - members and friends can post and access poetry, audio podcasts, photographs, videos and information on poetry events, competitions, fellowships, scholarships and tours.

Poets Union Inc. open house

The comrades over at the Poets Union Inc. have just been handed the keys to the kingdom i.e. the office administrator got the password to our website and she's not giving them back (well not yet). Via this shiny new Poets Union blog we plan to offer you your own set of keys to poetry in Australia.

The Poets Union aims to open up the world of poetry to Australian poets and in fact to anyone interested in poetry. Please visit the Poets Union at www.poetsunion.com

For more info. please contact us by email at info@poetsunion.com

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Cathy Bray reading from her chapbook ‘The Owl’

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21st Nov. Newtown Library – Cathy Bray reading from her chapbook ‘The Owl’ and reflecting on ‘Mad Woman’s Breakfast’

Event: poetry reading with Cathy Bray, from her 2010 chapbook ‘The Owl’ (from Picaro Press)
Date: Sunday 21st November
Time: 2.00 – 3.30 pm
Venue: Newtown Library, Gallery Level
Address: 8-10 Brown Street, Newtown

FREE EVENT - BOOKINGS ESSENTIAL
Please tel. Newtown Library: (02) 8512 4250

Cathy Bray – poetry reading mainly from her 2010 chapbook ‘The Owl’ (from Picaro Press) and reading New York poems and reflections on her show ‘Mad Woman’s Breakfast. Eat my Bush!’ which broached Australian ambivalence towards America, explored with 15 of her own poems in a ‘poetry salon gone mad’ at Madam Fling Flong in Newtown for the Sydney Fringe festival.

Thanks to Steve Mitchell, Newtown Library Team Leader and the City of Sydney Libraries.

RhiZomic Poetry end-of-year-party with Lyn Harding and Nigel Roberts

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In Sydney – RhiZomic Poetry end-of-year-party with Lyn Harding and Nigel Roberts. Wed. November 24
Poetry Party and open-mic.
Featuring: GUEST POETS: Nigel Roberts & Lyn Harding

Date: Wednesday November 24 - last Wed of the month (this time it’s the 4th Wednesday)
Time: 7-9 PM
Event: RhiZomiC Poetry (the last Wednesday of every month)
Venue: Kerrie Lowe Gallery
Address: 49 King St. Newtown
You are cordially invited to RhizomiC Poetry's end of year Party
Featuring: Nigel Roberts & Lyn Harding

Lyn Harding was born in Texas in 1938 and came to Australia in 1977. He was head Librarian at the Australian Defence Force Academy until retirement in 1998. He has published 2 books of verse: Dancing on the Drainboard (1993) and Australia Suite (1998). Another book is due out shortly.
Lyn lives in Sydney.

Nigel Roberts is well known for his lack of interesting hobbies . However he arrived in Balmain in 1969 and participated in the local blood sport , then known as poetry. His modest success here was promoted by the editng , printing & stapling of .. Free/Poetry , News & Weather, Packaged Deal... and others of the late sixties early seventies little mag revolution.
Roberts says that he took up poetry as tool to examine his own life .. and while he was at it ... the lives of others. In doing so he has published three collections : In Casablanca / for the waters (1977) Steps for Astaire ( 1984 ) & Deja vu Tours (1995 ). This year he has edited, with Martin Edmond , Steal Away Boy - The Collected Poems of David Mitchell for Auckland University Press.
Roberts Selected & New poems should be in the hands of his publisher next year.

Kerrie Lowe and Elisabeth Johnson
Kerrie Lowe Gallery
49 - 51 King St, Newtown 2042
Phone - 9550 4433 / Fax - 9550 1996
Web - www.kerrielowe.com
Mon-Sat 10am - 5.30 pm / Thurs till 7

Live Poets @ Don Bank 24 Nov.- guest poets Jim Low and Brian Bell. Poems of Your Blood's Country

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Wed 24th Nov. Live Poets @ Don Bank with Jim Low & Brian Bell
‘Poems of Your Blood’s Country’
Date: Wednesday, November 24
Time: doors open from 7.30 pm
Event: Live Poets @ Don Bank
Venue: Don Bank Museum
Address: 6 Napier St,
North Sydney
Entry: $7 entry includes supper and drinks.

During the evening there will be scenes from the life of HENRY LAWSON IN NORTH SYDNEY courtesy of the North Sydney Heritage Centre Walk and Talk Series. The loose theme this month will be: Poems of Your Blood's Country. There will be several reflections on the Australian way of expression throughout the evening.

SPECIAL GUESTS: Jim Low and Brian Bell
The Open Section features : Poems of Your Blood's Country.

About Jim Low and Brian Bell...
JIM LOW from the Blue Mountains will launch his new folk CD: Above the Creek Bed.
Warren Fahey has said of Jim's music: 'it is an important link to the country and its unique
culture'.
+ After supper...
bush poet, storyteller and social satirist: BRIAN BELL - past winner of the Gulgong Henry Lawson Award and the Will Ogilvie Prize - will regale us with his country take on contemporary issues. In his (in)famous poem: EFTPOS Brian presented 18 definitions of the term.
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As always there is an Open Section for writers and musicians. The loose theme this month will be: Poems of Your Blood's Country. There will be several reflections on the Australian way of expression throughout the evening.

Doors open 7.30 pm. $7 entry includes supper and drinks.
Further info: Danny Gardner (02) 9896 6956 Mobile: 0422 263 373 or at:
dannylivepoets@yahoo.com.au

Doors open 7.30 pm. $7 entry includes supper and drinks.
Further details: (02) 9896 6956 Mobile 0422 263 373 or at:
dannylivepoets@yahoo.com.au

Brett Whitleley Studio Poetry Reading - Sun. 28th Nov. guest Maggie Walsh

The Poets Union monthly poetry reading will be held on the fourth Sunday of the month, 28th November at the Brett Whiteley Studio in Sydney.

Date: Sunday 28th November
Guest poet: Maggie Walsh
Venue: Brett Whiteley Studio
Address: 2 Raper Street, Surry Hills (off Devonshire Street, via Esther Street and Esther Lane)
Time: 2.00 - 3.30 pm
Free entry. Open Mic included.
Guest poet: Maggie Walsh is a poet from Palm Island in far north Queensland. She considers herself an elder. She writes on her experience as a child growing up in the dormitory system and the light of Indigenous people. She writes powerful poetry and lyrics or song and is a natural performer. She will have you in laughter or in tears with her ability to take you to places through spoken word.

The Poets Union thanks the Brett Whiteley Studio staff and the Art Gallery of NSW for their support and we thank Rosnay wines for their wonderful wine and sponsorship.
Convenor: Angela Stretch for Poets Union Inc. Inquiries : 0438 898 578

The Poets Union is in Kings Cross

The Poets Union has returned to its ancestral homeland - back in the heart of Kings Cross in Sydney on Darlinghurst Road.

All along Darlinghurst Road are historical plaques giving the history of 'The Strip' as Darlinghurst Road and Macleay Street were affectionately and notoriously known. Just outside Kings Cross Library is a plaque with Kenneth Slessor's quote "You find this ugly, I find it lovely."

The Strip on the Strip -City of Villages is a wonderful booklet produced by the City of Sydney and available at their branch offices.
Photos by Cathy Bray.

Poets Union Events at Sydney Writers' Festival

Poets Union Events

Sydney Writers Festival 2010

Poets Union Event 1: (SWF Program no.128)

128 - Voices from Underground

An interactive performance by the Sydney-based group, Harbour City Poets, presenting all-new poems and a new chapbook. These edgy readings feature buried Sydney, from the city margins to the centre. Political, ecological and social issues surface from its history to disturb the smooth façade. Expect sewers and cemeteries, the Police Museum, convicts and larrikins of the nineteenth century, The Rocks (earliest Chinatown), rat plagues, jails, in fact anything subterranean (literally and metaphorically) that our poetic ventriloquy can re-create.

Date: Saturday May 15

Time: 5.30-7pm

Venue: Sydney Philharmonia Choir Studio

Cost: $5 at door (cash only)

MC: Margaret Bradstock

Time: 5.30-7pm

HARBOUR CITY POETS have been performing together for three years, basing their presentations on the premise that it is the poems (rather than the poets) that have something to say to each other. With multiple voices, the result is cumulative and cutting-edge.

The group has made successful appearances at the Riverside Theatre, Parramatta, and at Live Poets, North Sydney, in 2006; at Sydney University in 2007; at the Baulkham Hills Artsfest, and the Brett Whiteley studio in 2008 and 2010; and at the Sydney Writers’ Festival and Baulkham Hills Artsfest in 2009. Each performance uses different material, and themes and conversations vary accordingly.

128 - Personnel and biographies:

Margaret Bradstock has published five books of poetry. The most recent are The Pomelo Tree (which won the Wesley Michel Wright Prize), Coast (2005) and How Like the Past (2009). Other prizes include the Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson awards. In 2003 she was Asialink writer-in-residence at Peking University. Margaret is co-editor of Five Bells for the Poets Union, and Hon. Visiting Fellow at the University of NSW.

Kerry Leves is a NSW poet and critic, and a poetry reviewer for Overland. His most recent poetry collection is A Shrine to Lata Mangeshkar (Puncher & Wattman, 2008), which was shortlisted for the 2009 Kenneth Slessor Prize. Other recent books are Water Roars, Illusions Burn (Vagabond, 2002) and Territorial (Ant Studios, 1997). Kerry won the 2000 Bauhinia (Central Queensland University) Poetry Award, and was a runner-up in the Broadway Poetry Prize 2006.

David Musgrave has published three poetry collections: To Thalia (published by Five Islands Press in 2005), On Reflection, (Interactive Press, 2005) and a chapbook, Watermark (Picaro Press, 2006). In 2007 a cd, Open Water, was released by the River Road series. In 2008 he won the Josephine Ulrick Poetry Prize, the Newcastle Poetry Prize, and the Alec Bolton Prize for his unpublished manuscript, ‘Phantom Limb’. Phantom Limb will be published by John Leonard Press in late 2009.

Jenni Nixon is a poet and performer, whose work has appeared in numerous journals and small press anthologies, including Southerly, Overland, Blue Dog, Breaking Free, Open Boat: Barbed Wire Sky and Slam the Body Politik (synaptic graffiti collective). She published Café Boogie in 2004 (CD audio/text, Interactive Press, 2005, http://www.ipoz.biz/titles/cb.htm) and Agenda! (Picaro Press) in 2009.

Louise Wakeling is a Sydney poet and teacher. Her second collection of poetry, medium security, came out with Ginninderra Press (2002). In 2007 she was the recipient of a Premier’s English Teaching Award to research the teaching of poetry by poet-professors in universities and schools in the USA. Her third poetry collection, paragliding in a war zone, was published by Puncher & Wattmann (2008).

Poets Union Event 2: (SWF Program no. 239)

239 - DiVerse at the SH Ervin: A Poetic Response

Poets from the group DiVerse respond to images in the SH Ervin gallery, which this year will be from the Salon des Refuses. Their poems will be performed at the gallery, and the audience will receive chapbooks of their work.

Synopsis: A reading of ekphrastic* responses to the exhibition at the SH Ervin, presented by the eight talented and experienced members of the poetry group, DiVerse. *(Ekphrastic: one art form into another).

Venue: S.H. Ervin Gallery,

Address: Watson Rd, Observatory Hill, Sydney.

Time and Date: 3 - 4.30pm, Sunday 23rd May.

Door: Reading included free for cost of normal entry to SH Ervin gallery: $7 / $5

Contact at SH Ervin Gallery: Leah Haynes: Media & Public Programs Tel. (02) 9258 0150 or Email lhaynes@nsw.nationaltrust.org.au

MC and Event Co-ordinator: Robert Kennedy

DiVerse, which includes some extremely well-known poets, started in 2000, and has performed over 60 times in galleries and other institutions around Australia. Performances/exhibitions in 2006 include John Constable at the National Gallery of Australia, and Margaret Olley, Witness to War and The Sydney Printmakers Group at the National Trust: S.H. Ervin Gallery. In 2007 DiVerse performed at the Janet Dawson Survey, the Portia Geach Portrait Exhibition (both at S.H. Ervin) and the Sidney Nolan Exhibition at the Art Gallery of NSW. In 2008, the exhibitions DiVerse responded to were the Led Zeppelin World Tour and the Artworks of John R. Walker.

Each new performance is accompanied by the production of a booklet of poetry and images which is given away free to each member of the audience. In its ten years’ existence, DiVerse has produced almost twenty booklets of poetry.

The current poets in DiVerse are Jill Jones, Marcelle Freiman, Carolyne Bruyn, Margaret Bradstock, Louise Wakeling, Paula McKay, Sheryl Persson, Jo Wade and Robert Kennedy (facilitator).

239 – DiVerse Personnel:

Margaret Bradstock has published four books of poetry. The most recent are The Pomelo Tree (which won the Wesley Michel Wright Prize) and Coast (2005). In 2003 she was Asialink writer-in-residence at Peking University. Margaret is co-editor of Five Bells for the Poets Union, and Hon. Visiting Fellow at the University of NSW.

Carolyne Bruyn is a writer, professional archivist and freelance editor. She is the coordinator of the Sydney WEA Writers Workshop. Carolyne owns and runs EveryWrite, an internet-based manuscript appraisal and editing business: http://www.everywrite.com.au/

Marcelle Freiman is a poet and a lecturer in the Department of English, Macquarie University, where she teaches creative writing and diaspora literatures. Her poetry publications include poetry in journals in Australia and overseas and a book, Monkey’s Wedding (1995), which was Highly Commended for the Marjorie Barnard Prize.

Jill Jones’ latest book, Broken/Open (Salt, 2005), was shortlisted for both The Age Poetry Book of the Year in 2005 and the Kenneth Slessor Poetry Prize in 2006. She won the Kenneth Slessor Prize in 2003 for her fourth full-length book, Screens Jets Heaven. http://homepages.ihug.com.au/~jpjones/

Robert Kennedy is a poet, composer and freelance journalist. Robert founded and manages the poetry group DiVerse. http://diversepoets.blogspot.com/ He has had articles published in the Sydney Morning Herald, Cordite, State of the Arts, Five Bells and Newswrite, on the arts and social commentary.

Paula McKay lives and writes in Sydney. Her collection of poems, Travelling Incognito, was published by Five Islands Press in 2003. She is editor of the poetry E-zine Sydney Mosaic www.ram.net.au/users/paula

Sheryl Persson is a poet and educator. Her poems have been published in literary journals, anthologies and educational publications in Australia, New Zealand, England and the USA, including Black Inc’s Best Australian Poems 2004 and 2005. A collection of Sheryl’s poems, Scarcely Random, was recently published by Ginninderra Press.

Louise Wakeling is a Sydney poet and teacher. Her second collection of poetry, medium security, came out with Ginninderra Press (2002). In May 2007, she was the recipient of a Dept. of Education poetry research award. Her third poetry collection, paragliding in a war zone, was published by Puncher & Wattmann in December, 2008.

Poets Union Event 3: (SWF Program no.s 69,134 and 193)

69, 134 & 193 - A Season of Love at the Bar

Love at the Bar is a night of Australian love poems set to music by Ashley Chatto, and presented by Kath Ellis, Dave Stephenson and a band of quality musicians. The performances will be hosted by Laureate Productions, a small arts company which was formed to mount entertainment based in a variety of ways on Australian verse – with a particular focus on quality contemporary material.

Patrons will have the choice of watching the show with a meal – or with a complimentary glass of wine.

Venue: Sydney Dance Cafe

Dates: Thurs 20th May, Fri 21st May, Sat 22nd May

Time: 6.30-9pm.

Cost:: $45 for meal and glass of wine, or $25 (incl complimentary glass of wine).

Bookings: 9250 1988 or sydneytheatre.org.au

Media enquiries: Angela Stretch, Laureate Productions: 0434 898 578

Email: angela.stretch@gmail.com

(Please note: if you miss Love at the Bar at the SWF, there will be a further season at Ravel, in the Macquarie Hotel, during Sundays in June: details on the Laureate Productions’ website http://www.laureateproductions.com.au/ )

69, 134 & 193 (cont.) - Love at the Bar Personnel:

The Laureate Productions team is an offshoot of the Wordjammin’ Poetry Ensemble, which presented Darlinghurst Nights at the 2009 SWF. The production team is comprised of: composer Ashley Chatto, producer Angela Stretch, poetry consultant Martin Langford and visual artist DJ Young.

Kath Ellis is a singer, performer and a visual artist. She is the front woman for Sydney bands Hubris and Kathellisism. Her performance style is very theatrical using costumes and characters. She has performed at festivals around Australia, Europe and Java. In 2007, she co-founded and performed in a theatrical performance with Vashti Hughes and Trash Vaudeville for the Kings Cross festival called Sigh of the Cross.

Dave Stephenson is a Sydney musician, writer and teacher. He is best known for his performances with the contemporary folk band Waiting for Guinness.

Ashley Chatto is a jazz and classical guitarist/composer and arranger/pianist who studied at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. He has played with many of Sydney's leading jazz musicians including James Morrison, Evan Mannell, Casey Greene and Clayton Tomas. As an arranger he has produced music for some of Sydney's leading big bands. As a composer he has scored for short films, orchestra, string quartets and classical guitar.

Scott Leishman studied music at The Sydney Conservatorium of Music, he has played with many of the leading jazz musicians in Sydney. He worked with Jackie Orszaczky for over a decade and was part of Jackie's most influential bands 'The Godmothers'. He is also in demand as a bass player working in any musical style.

Angela Stretch is a visual artist, poet and founder of Wordjammin'. She holds a Masters degree in Journalism from the Sydney University of Technology. Angela toured as an emerging poet on the Statelines tour through NSW and VIC, funded by the Australia Council, 2007. She curated New Directions, a video poetry exhibit at the Australian Poetry Festival 2008, and was awarded the Australia Amnesty International Freedom Art Prize 2009. She is the coordinator of the Poets Union readings at the Brett Whiteley Gallery.

J D Young is a Sydney based visual artist who has practiced for twenty years as a painter and for the last ten years in video. He has collaborated with other artists in experimental projects such as the Australian collective Deprogram, and generates a mix of live and recorded material that challenges traditional approaches. His work typically accompanies live music, poetry, installation and site-specific pieces.

Martin Langford is the author of six poetry books. The Human Project, a Selected and New, was published by Puncher and Wattmann late in 2009. Other publications include Microtexts (Island, 2005) a book of aphorism and observation about poetics, and Harbour City Poems (ed. P&W, 2009), an anthology of poems about Sydney. He has directed the Australian Poetry Festival three times, and was the NSW Poetry Development Officer 2007-8.

Poets Union Event 4: (SWF Program numbers 57 and 218)

1. The Sydney Poetry Readings

2. The Sydney Readings: New Voices

For the past few years, the Poets Union has organised a series of readings whose purpose has been to highlight the quality of poetry produced in Sydney, and to promote the idea of Sydney as a creative city.

57 - The Sydney Poetry Reading

A one hour program featuring three respected Sydney poets:

Martin Harrison, Anna Kerdijk-Nicholson and David Musgrave

Time and Date: Thursday May 20th, 4-5pm

Venue: Bangarra Mezzanine

Duration: One hour

Entry: Free, no bookings

MC: Martin Langford

57 – The Sydney Poetry Reading Personnel:

Martin Harrison is a poet and critic. His selected poems Wild Bees: New andSelected Poems was published by University of Western Australia Press in2008, and was short-listed for the Adelaide Festival Poetry Prize. A selection of his poetry in Mandarin parallel text, A KangarooFarm, appeared that same year. He divides his time between Sydney and theHunter Valley. He teaches writing at the University of Technology.

David Musgrave is the publisher at Puncher & Wattmann. He has published three books; Open Water, a cd of a selection of his poetry, was released in 2007 as part of the River Road series. In 2008 he won both the Newcastle and Josephine Ulrick Poetry Prizes. He teaches at the University of Newcastle. His most recent publication is Phantom Limb (John Leonard Press, 2010).

Anna Kerdijk Nicholson's first book, The Bundanon Cantos, is a series ofpoems about Australian landscape. Anna went on to receive the 2001 ArtsQueensland Award for Unpublished Poetry (The Val Vallis) with one of thepoems from the book and The Bundanon Cantos became a Sydney Morning Herald Best Book of 2003. Her most recent book, Possession [FIP, 2010], is about Captain Cook's Endeavour voyage and colonial appropriation.

Martin Langford (MC) is the author of five poetry books, the most recent being The Human Project, a Selected and New, published by Puncher and Wattmann in 2009. He is the editor of Harbour City Poems (P&W, 2009), an anthology of poems about Sydney.

Poets Union Event 4: (SWF Program no.s 57 and 218)

218 - The Sydney Reading – New Voices

Craig Billingham, Jo Featherstone & Roberta Lowing

Time and Date: Sun May 23rd, 1-2pm

Venue: Bangarra Mezzanine

Duration: One hour

Entry: Free, no bookings

MC: Brook Emery

218 – The Sydney Reading – New Voices Personnel:

Craig Billingham emigrated from England at age fourteen. He studied Philosophy at Macquarie University before living overseas, first in Kobe, then Brussels, London, and Frankfurt. Since returning to Australia in 2003 he has completed an MA at the University of Sydney. His first collection of poems, Storytelling, was published in 2007. His work has been featured on ABC Radio National’s Poetica series, A Pod of Poets, and new poems have appeared in HEAT, Meanjin, Blue Dog, Going Down Swinging, and Famous Reporter. He lives in Katoomba.

Jo Featherstone established the Red Room Company in 2003. Her poetry has featured in journals such as Quadrant, Best Australian Poems (Black Inc) 2006 and 2009, Papertiger and Mascara. In 2006 she created a series of literary TV shows, The Wordshed, in partnership with The University of Western Sydney where she is a research associate. Johanna is an honorary associate of The University of Sydney's School of Letters Arts and Media. In 2008, she received a fellowship from the St James Ethics Centre.

Roberta Lowing’s poetry has appeared in Meanjin, Blue Dog, Five Bells and Overland. From 2006 to 2010, she convened Sydney’s monthly PoetryUnLimitedPress Poetry Readings; in 2007, she edited PULP’s Ilumina Journal. Roberta’s sequence on the Iraq War, Ruin, will be published by IP in June. Her first novel, Notorious, will be published in September by Allen & Unwin.

Brook Emery has published three collections: and dug my fingers in the sand, Misplaced Heart and Uncommon Light. He has won the Queensland Premier's Prize and been short-listed three times for the NSW Premier's Prize. He directed the Australian Poetry Festival in 2008, and will direct it again in September, 2010. He is the current Chair of the Poets Union.

Poets Union Event 5: (SWF See Exhibitions, p.6)

Exhibitions, p.6 - The Book of Water: A Collection of Video Poetry

The Book of Water is an exhibit of local and national video poems. Poems vary in length from 30 seconds to 5 minutes (A complete viewing might require 40 minutes.) The collection showcases the work of a variety of poets. Notes on their work will be incorporated into the video program.

The exhibition will collect work from the many scattered sources where media poetry is currently found (from the net; from new media grant recipients and graduate students; from traditional poets trying their hand), to enable people to have an idea of what is happening in this field.

Curation by Angela Stretch in consultation with organisations that promote or house media poetry.

Venue: Heritage Pier Upstairs

Entry: Free

Open: 10am – 5.30pm

Angela Stretch is a visual artist and poet. She was the curator of New Directions, a collection of video poetry screened at The Australian Poetry Festival 2008 and more recently at the Australian Centre for Moving Image. Angela is the founder of Wordjammin', a Sydney based organisation that fosters poetry and spoken word. She toured as an emerging poet in the 2007 Statelines Project through NSW and VIC. and is the coordinator of the Poets Union monthly reading at Sydney’s Brett Whiteley Gallery. She was awarded the Australia Amnesty International Freedom Art Prize 2009. She holds a Masters degree in Journalism from the Sydney University of Technology and is a freelance radio producer.

Poets Union Event 6: (SWF Program SR22 and SR23)

SR22 & SR23 - Poetica: Five Arrivals

Devised, written and peformed by poet Gillian Telford, composer Solange Kershaw and dancer/choreographer Francoise Angenieux, this unique soiree is structured along the lines of a symphony.

For the prelude, stroll through the enchanted surroundings of the Edogawa Commemorative Gardens at Gosford Regional Gallery, where digital installations mix with live music and poetry readings to bring to life the themes of voyage, displacement and migration.The second half of this event takes place inside the art gallery. Through dance, music and the poetic voice, Gillian, Solange and Francoise perform the five movements of their symphony, elaborating the theme of arrival and interweaving stories from personal, social and mythical levels.

Dates and times: Fri May 21, 7.30-8.30; Sun May 23rd, 4.30 – 5.30

Venue: Gosford Regional Gallery, 36 Webb St, East Gosford (show begins in Edogawa

Commemorative Gardens and concludes in the art gallery). A joint presentation of Gosford City Council, the Poets Union and Arts NSW.

Tickets: $20/$15.

Bookings: Tel. (02) 4323 3233, laycockstreettheatre.com

SR22 & SR23 Poetica: Five Arrivals - Personnel:

Gillian Telford Gillian Telford is a poet. Born in England of Irish parents, Gillian migrated to Australia after completing her secondary education. She has lived and worked in NSW and Tasmania in the fields of health and education as a speech pathologist, ESL teacher and administrator. Her poetry has been published regularly in literary journals and anthologies. Her longer poem sequences have twice been selected for inclusion in the Newcastle Poetry Prize anthologies ‘The Honey Fills the Cone’ and ‘Roadworks’. Her first collection of poems, ‘Moments of Perfect Poise’ was published in 2008.

Solange Kershaw Solange Kershaw is a sound artist and composer who explores working with different ways of hearing. Her fascinating creations are composed utilising the unique combination of found sounds and computer technologies. When Solange is not at the computer, it is the piano that fundamentally drives her compositions.

Francoise Angenieux Francoise Angenieux is a West African-born dancer whose extensive training spanned nine years across two continents including Dance Studies in Dakar Senegal, Africa and the Conservatoire de la Danse in Grenoble, France. Her career as a dancer began with Ballets de Monte Carlo and touring Germany with Schweizer/Tourne Theatre. After moving to Australia, Francoise was employed as a dance teacher at the University of New South Wales while dancing with Kinetic Energy Dance Company and Sydney City Ballet. In 1979 she joined the Sydney Dance Company, where she remained for 11 years.

AN EVENING PERFORMANCE

AS PART OF THE SYDNEY WRITERS’ FESTIVAL

GOSFORD REGIONAL GALLERY 21 & 23 MAY 2010

Poetica:Five Arrivals

Date: Friday 21 May 7.30pm

Sunday 23 May 4.30pm

Venue: Gosford Regional Gallery

Tickets: $20. Conc. $15

Limited tickets available T. 02 4323 3233

Online at www.laycockstreettheatre.com

At Laycock Street Theatre Box Office

Open 10am-5pm Mon - Fri

9am-12 noon Sat

'City Nightfall' "Writing poetry is a pleasure,...a pleasure out of hell" - Kenneth Slessor

City Nightfall - reflections on Kenneth Slessor
at The Sydney Fringe.

Event: CiTY NiGHTfall
Venue: The Seymour Centre, downstairs
Address: cnr Cleveland Street and City Road, opposite The University of Sydney.

Date: Wednesday 22nd September (22/9)
Time: at 8.45 pm
Tickets: $28 and $24 concession
Bookings: through www.thesydneyfringe.com.au/

About City Nightfall -

TAKE A STEP BACK IN TIME with a series of shapes from the pages of much loved Australian modernist poet, Kenneth Slessor.

Production crew of City Nightfall - Ashley Chatto, John Carey, Jeff Crawley, Geir Brillian Gunnarsson, Katherine Ellis, Martin Langford, Scott Leishman, Angela Stretch and Marc Van Doornum.

Love at the Bar - the poets, the poems and the production crew

Fresh from the Sydney Writers' festival...don't miss Love at the Bar!

Love at the Bar is a night of Australian love poems set to music by Ashley Chatto, and presented by Kath Ellis, Dave Stephenson, Kathleen Williamson and a band of quality musicians.

The performances will be hosted by Laureate Productions, a small arts company which was formed to mount entertainment based in a variety of ways on Australian verse – with a particular focus on quality contemporary material.

Venue: RAVAL, Macquarie Hotel, Wentworth Avenue,
Sydney
Dates: Sundays - 6th, 13th and 20th June
Time: 7.30-11.00 pm
Cost: $25
Bookings: through Moshtix
Media enquiries: Angela Stretch, Laureate Productions: 0434 898 578Email: angela.stretch@gmail.com

Details of the poets and the performers in the Poets Union e-newsletter and at the websites below: http://www.laureateproductions.com.au/
http://www.poetsunion.com/

The Laureate Productions team is an offshoot of the Wordjammin’ Poetry Ensemble, which presented Darlinghurst Nights at the 2009 SWF. The production team is comprised of: composer Ashley Chatto, producer Angela Stretch, poetry consultant Martin Langford and visual artist DJ Young.

Love at the Bar - Production Crew:
Ashley Chatto is a composer, jazz and classical guitarist, pianist who has worked with some of the Australia’s leading jazz players. He has composed music for theatre, film and big bands. His last major work was writing the music to An Evening of Darlinghurst Nights, a tribute to Kenneth Slessor, which premiered in association with the 2009 Sydney Writers Festival.

Geir Brillian Gunnarsson is a native of Iceland, and a musician of sorts. He has been producing and composing music for the last 22 years. Recipient of the Best Original Score award at Tropfest 2009, and producer for many albums in including; Ophelia of the Spirits, Harii Bandhu, Oka, Favourite Son, Kiko etc. He writes music for theatre, and is always on the lookout for new avenues for his endeavors. Currently he is producing a variety of singer/songwriters, as well as putting the finishing touches on his album "Friends Lovers & Others" under the moniker of "Pearldivers of the Subconcious".

Kath Ellis is a singer, performer and a visual artist. She has been a pregnant ribbon dancer after an awesome foursome with the Olympics swimming team, a devout Christian house wife with a copy of Oprah Winfrey’s wise quotes, a nazi leotard wearing physical education instructor and a perpetual brides maid out for revenge as the front woman for Sydney bands Hubris and Kathellisism. Her performance style is very theatrical using costumes and characters. She has performed at festivals around Australia, Europe and Java, Indonesia with her bands and as a guest performer. She co-devised and performed in a theatrical performance with Vashti Hughes and Trash Vaudeville for the Kings Cross Festival. She has M.C.’d events such as the Newtown Festival and various gigs and corporate events around Sydney. Kath also performed in An Evening of Darlinghurst Nights by Kenneth Slessor in association with the 2009 Sydney Writers Festival.

Martin Langford has published six books of poetry, including The Human Project:New and Selected Poems (P&W, 2009). Thematically, he is interested in the way we try to imagine ourselves beyond our biological inheritance, and in the evolution of our social and imaginative spaces. He lives on the northern outskirts of Sydney, and the landscape of that area often features in his work. In Microtexts (Island 2005), which is a book of poetics, he argues for poetry’s engagement with the other, and against the enlargement obsessions of our standard narratives. He is the editor of Harbour City Poems: Sydney in Verse 1788-2008 (P&W, 2009).

Scott Leishman studied music at The Sydney Conservatorium of Music, he has played with many of the leading Jazz musicians in Sydney. He worked with Jackie Orszaczky for over a decade and was part of Jackie's most influential bands 'The Godmothers'. He is also in demand as a Bass player working in any musical style.

Dave Stephenson is a Sydney musician, writer and teacher. He is a founding member of the contemporary folk band Waiting for Guinness, with whom he has performed at major music festivals around Australia, including the Woodford Folk Festival, the Port Fairy Folk Festival and the Adelaide Fringe Festival. Dave performed in the production of An Evening of Darlinghurst Nights by Kenneth Slessor in association with the 2009 Sydney Writers Festival.

Angela Stretch is the founder of Wordjammin’, a Sydney based organisation that fosters poetry and spoken word. Angela’s work extends to visual art that explores text with audio-visual technologies and was awarded People’s Choice Award at the 2008 Australian Ethical Art Prize. Staged an audio-visual poem Five Buoys, housed in a 44 foot geo-desic dome, River Beats Festival 2008. She was awarded Highly Recommended in the Marrickville Council Art Prize 2009. Curator of New Directions, a collection of video-poems for the Australian Poetry Festival 2008 and Overload Poetry Festival 2009. Produced, Directed and performed in An Evening of Darlinghurst Nights a tribute to Kenneth Slessor in association with the 2009 Sydney Writers Festival.

Marc Van Doornum is one of the leading Flamenco Guitarists in Australia he has worked with many of the top Flamenco artists in Australia including many years working with Diana Reyes Flamenco Dance Company. He has also recently finished studying guitar in Spain with some of the best flamenco guitarists in the world. When not playing flamenco he plays jazz and composes music.

Kathleen Williamson is a versatile singer-songwriter who has worked with a range of local and international acts over the last decade, from early collaborations with The Herd to sharing the stage with Josh Groban, Delta Goodrem, Evermore and Abi Tucker. From a classical and jazz vocal background, Kathleen is emerging in the world of independent music, releasing her debut album “Little While” in August 2009. Earmarked by Kathleen’s keening vocals and delicate arrangements, her cartwheeling original songs are “a little bit folk-rock and a little bit blues-pop”. Kathleen has performed for audiences across Sydney, the UK and France.

J D Young is a Sydney based visual artist who has practiced for twenty years as a painter and for the last ten years in video. He has collaborated with other artists in experimental projects such as the Australian collective Deprogram, and generates a mix of live and recorded material that challenges traditional approaches. His work typically accompanies live music, poetry, installation and site specific pieces.

Love at the Bar - The Poets and Poems:
(Notes by Martin Langford)

1. Dorothy Hewett (1923-2002) - The Golden Mean
Hewett was both a playwright and a poet. In The Golden Mean, a great romantic and feminist looks back: time has passed (she has lost her power as a young beauty) – but rather than being sentimental, she is proud of how hard she played the game. This was written by an old woman who had always loved love, men, eros; who had taken great risks to pursue what she saw as her right to erotic happiness – someone who remembers the pleasures and risks of love, but also the pressures to be strait-laced and sensible, like the frogmouth in the poem. For all her pride, however, in her energy and her attractiveness – in the poem it is she who carried Cupid’s arrows – there was something paradisal about the world she played in as a girl, and that continues to
haunt her, even now.

2. Julian Croft – The Bar at the Rock Garden
Julian Croft was born in Newcastle, and now lives in New England. In much of his work he has honoured the working class lives and landscapes he grew up in, but in this poem – though it still has a working-class groundedness – he finds himself thinking about the nature of the energy at a classic rock venue – The Rock Garden, in England. It is the early eighties, and he has come to see some of the bands of the time – The Flats, The Clash. What strikes him, however, is that even while the bands play on “blasting the black paint off soft gut walls”, the girl behind the bar just goes about her business, and no-one seems to see how the whole purpose of the place is to put that loud male energy out there, to get through to girls like her, to impress her, to make her aware of their need.

3. Lesbia Harford (1891-1927) - untitled
Harford was a sexual and political radical – a brave, livewire voice. Brought up by her mother after the family’s fortunes collapsed, and her father had to leave for laboring work in WA, she graduated in law from Melbourne. Instead of practising, however,she worked in textile factories to be closer to the people whose cause she fought for politically. Born with defective valves of the heart, she battled ill-health all her life, and eventually died at thirty-six. Very little of her work was published during her lifetime. This poem shows her resistance to being taken for granted, and her sense of herself as someone independent, and not just a reflection of the male.

4. John Jenkins – Why I Like You.
John Jenkins (b. 1949) is a Melbourne poet. He has published eight books of poems, including the recent long meditation on life in the fifties, Growing up with Mr Menzies. As well as poetry, he has written extensively in other areas, including travel and music, and on music-theatre. He has also worked on many collaborations – often across different media. Why I Like You is not a typical John Jenkins poem, but we selected it for its attractive idiosyncrasy of tone: the lightness of touch with which it finds a way to praise the poet’s partner in a way that isn’t corny – and that is not always an easy thing to do.

5. Geraldine McKenzie – Sleeping Together
Geraldine McKenzie is a Blue Mountains poet who wrote a book called Duty (Paperbark Press, 2001). In many of the poems, she is concerned with the play of language and ideas, and with exploring these experimentally, but Sleeping Together is a straightfoward celebration of the joy of sleeping with a loved partner – not conscious, but not completely unconscious either: never quite letting go, but letting the ocean of feeling and proximity wash around her.

6. Kate Llewellyn – Finished and Sassy
Kate Llewellyn is one of a slightly earlier generation of writers who began as great romantics, enjoying the freedoms that opened up for women of her generation – but who, when those perspectives collided with the feminism of the seventies, had the honesty to examine what her life might mean in their light. Like all good writers about love, she wrote bravely about her experiences, and it is this courage which gives strength to her work. Later, she wrote several bestselling diary-style reflections, such as The Waterlily, in which she revisited some of this material in prose.

7. MTC Cronin – I Am In Love, The Specifics of Love, There is No More Time
MTC Cronin is a mid-career poet who, as well as being a prolific writer of poetry (she has published 17 books of poems, counting translations and collaborations) is also a great experimenter with related forms – such as essays and prose poems. At various stages of what still seems like a short writing career, Cronin has written large numbers of love poems – particularly in The World Beyond the Fig (Five Islands, 1998), and in My Lover’s Back (UQP, 2002). The three poems we have chosen all come from My Lover’s Back. As with all good writers of love poems, she is not afraid to own her own emotions – as in the first two of the poems we will be featuring. There is No More Time, on the other hand, is as bleak a picture of the nullity that comes at the end of love as one could imagine.

8. Kevin Hart – I think that hardly anyone
This is another poem insisting on the half-heartedness – the pusillanimity – with which love is too often pursued. Kevin Hart is a Professor of English based much of the time, these days, on the east coast of America. He has been an important presence on the Australian writing scene since the 1980’s, and particularly since Peniel, a book of masterly meditations on negative theology. Born in the UK, Hart was raised in Brisbane, and memories of that city figure prominently in his work. A selection of his poems is available in Flame Tree (Paperbark, 2002).

9. Russell Erwin – Awaiting Resolution
Russell Erwin is a farmer and teacher on the Southern Tablelands of NSW. The poem we selected is from a book called From Here (Indigo/Ginnenderra, 2001). It is a poem about an image which the poet has been haunted by – perhaps from a dream, perhaps from a movie: a man is riding towards a “high, cold sierra”; a girl is feeding chickens. They are not part of a story, they do not seem to know each other, let alone be lovers. But something about them makes them represent, for Erwin, all the relationships which could have occurred, but which don’t; all the distances between people which never get bridged – in short, the love that doesn’t happen.

10. John Forbes (1950-1998) – Love Poem
This is widely regarded as a classic contemporary love poem. John Forbes was a shrewd and acerbic critic of contemporary culture, but sometimes he would write poems which drew a relationship between the power-games and craziness of the broader culture, and the difficult travelling he was doing himself. In this poem, he implies there is a link between the sexual losses and unhappiness of Western males, and the way the media-management of wars by politicians like Bush help them to forget such things. Despite this, the loneliness of the person watching is never really lessened by the distant vindication of his ego in Iraq , or his knowledge about the weaponry.

11. Marcella Polain – You Are My Absurdist Angle
Marcella Polain is a contemporary poet from Western Australia. You Are My Absurdist Angle is a poem which is absolutely charged with erotic feeling. This is one of the poems we were thinking of when we said that women had a new freedom to explore the erotic: in fact sometimes it seems they are more willing to explore such material than men – who can be a little coy about such things!

12. Gwen Harwood (1920-95) – The Owl and the Pussycat Baudelaire Rock
Gwen Harwood was a small, twinkling lady who led a very conventional life, but who was also outrageously mischievous. As a girl, during the war, she drove her bosses crazy at the Brisbane requisitioning depot where she worked, because of the Goonstyle games she played; she caused a scandal in the sixties when it was found out that it was she, sweet Gwen, who had been taking the piss out of editors with her various pseudonyms, all mailed from different locations around Australia (with the assistance of friends). A bigger scandal occurred when it was found one of her poems was printed (in The Bulletin) without anyone realising that the first letters of each line spelt F-U-C-K-A-L-L-E-D-I-T-O-R-S. Mostly, her material was relatively mainstream – well-crafted, intellectually confident, increasingly direct and moving in later years. But this poem, from her last book, but written twenty years earlier, just about defines “left field”. It is a desperate love song – an invocation to keep going, to keep loving each other, even though the night is coming, and no-one knows where they are going – even though, if she is heading towards heaven, she has always found it hard to believe in the resurrection of the body – a body such as her lover’s “at my side in the rocking darkness”. It is both an assertion of love, and perhaps even of faith (of the expectation of heaven) but also of despair, of the end coming and not knowing what that means. Why the title? One guess is that something she saw in the directness of emotion in rock music gave her a way of speaking with the directness she needed herself. Presumably the owl and the pussycat are there because they too “went to sea” – off into the great unknown – though the absurdity of the nonsense poem may also have suited her sense of absurdity. And Baudelaire? It is partly a crack at people who invoke Baudelaire’s name as a sign they are doing something poetic – without necessarily having read him – but it is also a nod to the world of Baudelaire’s extreme imagination, one she is going to enter herself in this poem. By the time she did publish it, she had developed the cancer that would eventually kill her, so perhaps she thought that it was an appropriate time to air such a confronting work.

Love at the Bar - Personnel Summary:
Poetry by: Julian Croft, MTC Cronin, Russel Erwin, John Forbes, Lesbia Harford, Kevin Hart, Gwen Harwood, Dorothy Hewett, John Jenkins, Kate Llewellyn, Geraldine McKenzie and Marcella Polain
Produced and Directed by: Angela Stretch
Music composed by: Ashley Chatto
Video art by: JD Young
Performers: Kath Ellis, David Stephenson, Kathleen Williamson
Music performed by: Ashley Chatto, Scott Leishman, Marc Van doornum

29 April - 9 September POETRY LAB BY EMAIL with poet Julie Chevalier

In Sydney – starting 29 April an online workshop with Julie Chevalier POETRY LAB BY EMAIL

POETRY LAB BY EMAIL With Julie Chevalier (10CHEV4)

Course dates: Thurs. 29 April – Thurs. 9 September

Full price: $450

Venue: on-line course

Enquiries: NSW Writers’ Centre Phone (02) 9555 9757

Email: workshops@nswwriterscentre.org.au

Want to write poetry but can’t make it to a course or workshop? Need individual feedback on your work without leaving the house? Join widely published poet and teacher Julie Chevalier for an online, interactive poetry writing course.

You will write six poems using exercises and related materials sent by e-mail. Each poem receives written comments. Approximately every three weeks you will receive a poetry exercise, poems, commentary and related materials. Take a couple of weeks to explore the materials, write and rewrite a short poem, and e-mail it to the tutor. You will then receive the next exercise and materials along with the tutor’s constructive comments on your poem.

This course is suitable for someone who is interested in writing contemporary poetry and has reliable email. It fills the gap between working through exercises in a book (although books are recommended) and working with a mentor. It enables people who are unable to access courses and workshops because of isolation, time or distance to receive personal feedback to improve their poems. Students are offered the opportunity to contact each other. HSC students are welcome.

Enquiries: NSW Writers’ Centre

Phone (02) 9555 9757 Fax (02) 9818 1327

Email: workshops@nswwriterscentre.org.au

Website: www.nswwriterscentre.org.au

Southerly Australian literary journal : Southerly 69.3 - a special Poetry edition

In Sydney launch of Southerly 69.3 special Poetry edition
Message from the Editors of Southerly...

Dear Poets,

Southerly invites you to subscribe to Southerly and receive issue 69.3, the Poetry Special Issue. This volume continues Southerly’s tradition of publishing and promoting the best in Australian literature, and with this launch, we wish to celebrate this issue's focus on poetry and poetics.

Enquiries: to southerlyjournal@gmail.com

Kind Regards,
Tessa Lunney, on behalf of the Editors

poet Adam Aitken's photos from the Sydney Writers' Festival http://adamaitken.blogspot.com/

Gosford event SWF SR22 & SR23 - Poetica: Five Arrivals

Poets Union Event 6: (SWF Program SR22 and SR23)

SR22 & SR23 - Poetica: Five Arrivals

Devised, written and peformed by poet Gillian Telford, composer Solange Kershaw and dancer/choreographer Francoise Angenieux, this unique soiree is structured along the lines of a symphony.

For the prelude, stroll through the enchanted surroundings of the Edogawa Commemorative Gardens at Gosford Regional Gallery, where digital installations mix with live music and poetry readings to bring to life the themes of voyage, displacement and migration.The second half of this event takes place inside the art gallery. Through dance, music and the poetic voice, Gillian, Solange and Francoise perform the five movements of their symphony, elaborating the theme of arrival and interweaving stories from personal, social and mythical levels.

Dates and times: Fri May 21, 7.30-8.30; Sun May 23rd, 4.30 – 5.30

Venue: Gosford Regional Gallery, 36 Webb St, East Gosford (show begins in EdogawaCommemorative Gardens and concludes in the art gallery).

Tickets: $20/$15.

Bookings: Tel. (02) 4323 3233, laycockstreettheatre.com

A joint presentation of Gosford City Council, the Poets Union and Arts NSW.

SR22 & SR23 Poetica: Five Arrivals -

Personnel:Gillian Telford Gillian Telford is a poet. Born in England of Irish parents, Gillian migrated to Australia after completing her secondary education. She has lived and worked in NSW and Tasmania in the fields of health and education as a speech pathologist, ESL teacher and administrator. Her poetry has been published regularly in literary journals and anthologies. Her longer poem sequences have twice been selected for inclusion in the Newcastle Poetry Prize anthologies ‘The Honey Fills the Cone’ and ‘Roadworks’. Her first collection of poems, ‘Moments of Perfect Poise’ was published in 2008.

Solange Kershaw Solange Kershaw is a sound artist and composer who explores working with different ways of hearing. Her fascinating creations are composed utilising the unique combination of found sounds and computer technologies. When Solange is not at the computer, it is the piano that fundamentally drives her compositions.

Francoise Angenieux Francoise Angenieux is a West African-born dancer whose extensive training spanned nine years across two continents including Dance Studies in Dakar Senegal, Africa and the Conservatoire de la Danse in Grenoble, France. Her career as a dancer began with Ballets de Monte Carlo and touring Germany with Schweizer/Tourne Theatre. After moving to Australia, Francoise was employed as a dance teacher at the University of New South Wales while dancing with Kinetic Energy Dance Company and Sydney City Ballet. In 1979 she joined the Sydney Dance Company, where she remained for 11 years.

AN EVENING PERFORMANCE AS PART OF THE SYDNEY WRITERS’ FESTIVAL

GOSFORD REGIONAL GALLERY 21 & 23 MAY 2010Poetica:Five Arrivals

Date: Friday 21 May 7.30pmSunday 23 May 4.30pmVenue: Gosford Regional GalleryTickets: $20. Conc. $15

Limited tickets available T. 02 4323 3233Online at http://www.laycockstreettheatre.com/At Laycock Street Theatre Box OfficeOpen 10am-5pm Mon - Fri9am-12 noon Sat

no.128 SWF: Voices from Underground - Harbour City Poets

Sydney Writers Festival 2010

Poets Union Event 1: (SWF Program no.128)
128 - Voices from Underground An interactive performance by the Sydney-based group, Harbour City Poets, presenting all-new poems and a new chapbook.

These edgy readings feature buried Sydney, from the city margins to the centre. Political, ecological and social issues surface from its history to disturb the smooth façade. Expect sewers and cemeteries, the Police Museum, convicts and larrikins of the nineteenth century, The Rocks (earliest Chinatown), rat plagues, jails, in fact anything subterranean (literally and metaphorically) that our poetic ventriloquy can re-create.

Date: Saturday May 15
Time: 5.30-7pm Venue: Sydney Philharmonia Choir Studio
Cost: $5 at door (cash only)
Time: 5.30-7pm
MC: Margaret Bradstock

HARBOUR CITY POETS have been performing together for three years, basing their presentations on the premise that it is the poems (rather than the poets) that have something to say to each other. With multiple voices, the result is cumulative and cutting-edge. The group has made successful appearances at the Riverside Theatre, Parramatta, and at Live Poets, North Sydney, in 2006; at Sydney University in 2007; at the Baulkham Hills Artsfest, and the Brett Whiteley studio in 2008 and 2010; and at the Sydney Writers’ Festival and Baulkham Hills Artsfest in 2009. Each performance uses different material, and themes and conversations vary accordingly.
128 - Voices from Underground: Personnel and biographies...
Margaret Bradstock has published five books of poetry. The most recent are The Pomelo Tree (which won the Wesley Michel Wright Prize), Coast (2005) and How Like the Past (2009). Other prizes include the Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson awards. In 2003 she was Asialink writer-in-residence at Peking University. Margaret is co-editor of Five Bells for the Poets Union, and Hon. Visiting Fellow at the University of NSW.
Kerry Leves is a NSW poet and critic, and a poetry reviewer for Overland. His most recent poetry collection is A Shrine to Lata Mangeshkar (Puncher & Wattman, 2008), which was shortlisted for the 2009 Kenneth Slessor Prize. Other recent books are Water Roars, Illusions Burn (Vagabond, 2002) and Territorial (Ant Studios, 1997). Kerry won the 2000 Bauhinia (Central Queensland University) Poetry Award, and was a runner-up in the Broadway Poetry Prize 2006.
David Musgrave has published three poetry collections: To Thalia (published by Five Islands Press in 2005), On Reflection, (Interactive Press, 2005) and a chapbook, Watermark (Picaro Press, 2006). In 2007 a cd, Open Water, was released by the River Road series. In 2008 he won the Josephine Ulrick Poetry Prize, the Newcastle Poetry Prize, and the Alec Bolton Prize for his unpublished manuscript, ‘Phantom Limb’. Phantom Limb will be published by John Leonard Press in late 2009.
Jenni Nixon is a poet and performer, whose work has appeared in numerous journals and small press anthologies, including Southerly, Overland, Blue Dog, Breaking Free, Open Boat: Barbed Wire Sky and Slam the Body Politik (synaptic graffiti collective). She published Café Boogie in 2004 (CD audio/text, Interactive Press, 2005, http://www.ipoz.biz/titles/cb.htm) and Agenda! (Picaro Press) in 2009.
Louise Wakeling is a Sydney poet and teacher. Her second collection of poetry, medium security, came out with Ginninderra Press (2002). In 2007 she was the recipient of a Premier’s English Teaching Award to research the teaching of poetry by poet-professors in universities and schools in the USA. Her third poetry collection, paragliding in a war zone, was published by Puncher & Wattmann (2008).

SWF - ZALZALA: Inner Quakes and After Shocks. 3 performances

ZALZALA: Inner Quakes and After Shocks
Sydney Writers Festival event – Auburn Poets and Writers’ Group (APWG) 18th May, 20th May and 22nd May

Performance 1: ZALZALA: Inner Quakes and After Shocks
Date:Tuesday 18 May
Time: 6.30 pm
Venue: Peacock Gallery
Address: Auburn Botanic Gardens
Entry : Free entry

Performance 2: ZALZALA Inner Quakes and After Shocks
Date: Thursday 20 May
Time: 6.00 pm
Venue: Riverside Theatre
Address: Parramatta
Entry : Free entry

Performance 3: ZALZALA Inner Quakes and After Shocks
Date: Saturday 22 May
Time: 10.00 am
Venue: Bangarra Mezzanine
Address: Walsh Bay, Sydney
Entry : Free entry

The Earth Quakes:Listen as APWG goes under the skin of culture shock.Cultures within cultures:intersexions of body and soulful words, dislocations of place and inner languages, a collidescope of climate changes in the whether.
Tremors of the heart: A collaborative spoken-word performance in English, Tamil, Arabic and Farsi, creating rhythms and linkages between the experience of change in culture and climate.
Shocking:
For further information please phone Auburn Community Development Network (ACDN) onTel. (02) 9649 5559 or
Email: Alissar Chidiac at ACDN auburnarts@acdn.org.au

David Musgrave, LK Holt & Petra White launch of 3 poetry books from JOHN LEONARD PRESS

In Sydney Saturday, 1st May 2010 – 1.30 pm
launch of 3 collections, John Leonard Press.
Message from LK Holt / publisher J O H N L E O N A R D P R E S S : John Leonard Press is launching three poetry books in Sydney on the 1st of May.

Event: JOHN LEONARD PRESS BOOK LAUNCH.
Three new collections by David Musgrave, LK Holt & Petra White.

Date: Saturday 1st May,
Time: 1.30pm
Venue: at The Friend in Hand Hotel,
Address: 58 Cowper St, Glebe.

More information contact: johnleonardpress@gmail.comLK Holt / publisherJ O H N L E O N A R D P R E S S www.johnleonardpress.comPO Box 21314Little Lonsdale StMelbourneVIC 8011

Dark Bright Doors by Jill Jones - launched by Debra Adelaide at Gleebooks

In Sydney Sat. 10 April - Dark Bright Doors: Jill Jones launch of her new collection at Gleebooks

Jill Jones latest book, Dark Bright Doors, published by Wakefield Press, was launched by Debra Adelaide at Gleebooks on Saturday 10th April 2010.

Jill Jones’ sixth book, 'Dark Bright Doors', raises questions of the self, as well as the ecology of place and language. This is Jones at her most versatile and idiosyncratic, at times a little wild and dark. The poems are intimate, sharp, self-critical and very present.

Jill now lives in Adelaide so this was a great chance to catch up with her in her old home town of Sydney.

May 3 at 8pm - poet Mary Tang at Belvoir Street

Performance 4a and Company B Belvoir present ONE PERFORMANCE ONLY :
Directed by renowned storyteller, photographer and performer William Yang and producer/writer Annette Shun Wah.

Monday 3 May at 8.00pm
Belvoir St Upstairs Theatre
25 Belvoir St, Surry Hills.
Tickets: $25 (Concessions $20)Bookings: http://www.belvoir.com.au/eastandwest or 02 9699 3444 Visit the Performance 4a website

Six storytellers confront their family skeletons to flesh out the stories of the here and now. Accompanied by images from private collections, they reveal engaging and moving insights into family, identity, ambition, confusion and determination...

Daphne Lowe Kelley’s mother leaves the family village for the first time, crossing oceans in search of a missing husband. Father, now a lingerie salesman, didn’t know what was coming...

Poet Mary Tang’s Chinese horoscope predicted she would bring bad luck, so her family gave her away. She recounts the many ways in which she is lucky to be alive.

Choreographer/performer Paul Cordeiro’s mother almost had him convinced of their English ancestry, until his aunty said: “but look at our eyes”. How does he deal with being “not exactly Chinese”?

Actor/writer Joy Hopwood relates her arduous, but often hilarious quest – to become a Playschool presenter.

Malaysian-Chinese actor Teik-Kim Pok explores his boyhood fascination with the west within a family characterised by niggles between middle class relatives and the “country hicks”.

Visual artist Mai Long’s artwork ignited controversy for some in the Vietnamese community, but brings her a better understanding of her family, particularly her dad, who was “not a communicator”.

18 May – a poetry Masterclass was held with Nessa O’Mahony at UNSW

In Sydney at UNSW – a poetry Masterclass was held with Irish poet, Nessa O’Mahony

Message from Dr Paul Dawson, Senior Lecturer, School of English, Media and Performing Arts at UNSW about a pre-Sydney Writers’ Festival event...

The Irish poet, Nessa O’Mahony, who will be coming out for the Sydney Writer’s Festival, gave a poetry masterclass here at UNSW next week.

About Nessa O'Mahony : Irish poet, Nessa O’Mahony http://www.writerscentre.ie/html/tutors/nessaom.htm

Participation : Those attending the workshop were encouraged to email a poem and 9 of the participants delivered their poems in time for the workshop.

About Nessa O’Mahony: http://www.writerscentre.ie/html/tutors/nessaom.htm

Poets Union Inc.

Friend in Hand Hotel resident cockatoo

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

River Road - poet Caddy

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

What is the duende?

Saturday, November 7, 2009

Poets Union Inc. now has a group on Facebook

Poets Union Inc. open house

John Carey, Angela Stretch, Christine Carey, Martin Langford and Sue Emery

Brook Emery MC having a chuckle as

'You find this ugly, I find it lovely' - Kenneth Slessor

The Owl (Picaro Press 2010)

Cathy Bray reading from her chapbook ‘The Owl’

Thank you from Mad Woman's Breakfast at The Sydney Fringe

RhiZomic Poetry end-of-year-party

RhiZomic Poetry end-of-year-party with Lyn Harding and Nigel Roberts

Live Poets @ Don Bank 24 Nov.- guest poets Jim Low and Brian Bell. Poems of Your Blood's Country

Poets Union Monthly reading at Brett Whiteley Studio

Brett Whitleley Studio Poetry Reading - Sun. 28th Nov. guest Maggie Walsh

National Science Week & the Poets Union present

Science Made Marvellous - 17th August launch

Science Made Marvellous – National Science Week

Invitation to Science Made Marvellous

'INVENTING THE TRADITION'

The Poets Union is in Kings Cross

Kings Cross Knitted

Kings Cross Knitted Art and About

Les Murray - poetry at Ballast Point, Sydney Harbour

Launch of book format Five Bells in May 2009

Poets Union Events at Sydney Writers' Festival

Live Poets

Poet and actor John Carey

Poetry at The Sydney Fringe festival

Laureate Productions present City Nightfall

'City Nightfall' "Writing poetry is a pleasure,...a pleasure out of hell" - Kenneth Slessor

Candy Royalle at The Sydney Fringe

lOVE @ tHE bAR

Love at the Bar

Love at the Bar from Laureate Productions

Love at the Bar - the poets, the poems and the production crew

POETRY LAB BY EMAIL with Julie Chevalier. On-line course starts Thursday 29 April - NSW Writers' Ce

29 April - 9 September POETRY LAB BY EMAIL with poet Julie Chevalier

Kate Lilley, Editor,(centre) at Southerly launch

Invitation to SOUTHERLY 69.3

Southerly Australian literary journal : Southerly 69.3 - a special Poetry edition

poets Phil Hammiel, Adam Aitken and Julie Chevalier

poet Adam Aitken's photos from the Sydney Writers' Festival http://adamaitken.blogspot.com/

SWF in Gosford 21st and 23rd May

Gosford event SWF SR22 & SR23 - Poetica: Five Arrivals

SR22 & SR23 SWF Poetica: Five Arrivals

128 SWF Voices from Underground

no.128 SWF: Voices from Underground - Harbour City Poets

128 SWF Voices from Underground

no.128 SWF Voices from Underground

SWF - ZALZALA: Inner Quakes and After Shocks. 3 performances

ZALZALA:Inner quakes and after-shocks

David Musgrave, LK Holt & Petra White launch of 3 poetry books from JOHN LEONARD PRESS

poet Jill Jones and writer Debra Adelaide

Dark Bright Doors by Jill Jones - launched by Debra Adelaide at Gleebooks

Performance 4a and Belvoir Street

Performance 4a and Belvoir Street

May 3 at 8pm - poet Mary Tang at Belvoir Street

18 May – a poetry Masterclass was held with Nessa O’Mahony at UNSW

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