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My husband has returned. A traveller whose flight was cancelled has found his way home. He slowly unpacks while I make space for the unexpected.
... (read more)In this episode of Australian Book Review's States of Poetry podcast, Jelena Dinic reads her poem 'Alterations to the little black dress' which features in the 2016 South Australian anthology.
... (read more)In this episode of Australian Book Review's States of Poetry podcast, Jelena Dinic reads her poem 'Handbag' which features in the 2016 South Australian anthology.
... (read more)In this episode of Australian Book Review's States of Poetry podcast, Jelena Dinic reads her poem 'Babysitting' which features in the 2016 South Australian anthology.
... (read more)In this episode of Australian Book Review's States of Poetry podcast, Jelena Dinic reads her poem 'The Silence of Siskins' which features in the 2016 South Australian anthology.
... (read more)A little pin-up
three fingers
above the knees.
Behind the curtain
a dress-up game –
pretty things come undone.
He chalks lines
on raw stitches.
I catwalk.
My body fits the timeless black.
'You can live in it, or die'
smile the lips full of needles.
Do I look a little dead
with black fabric
on bone-pale flesh?
for my grandfather
He circles my arrival
on the calendar.
It is late November
and it doesn't snow.
A wooden pallet
hardens his bed.
He dreams of grandmother.
He doesn't want new dreams.
Two siskins in cages –
their song frozen like the air
that other November
when she lost her heart
c ...
for Mia
I wore my grandmother's clothes
and sat on her doorstep.
Monday to Friday.
She talked.
I lied.
'I'll teach you how to write,' I said
pretending I could
hold a pen.
'Mouse will eat your ears,' she smiled.
At night we leaned on pillows
watched TV with subtitles.
I made up foreign words.
I tol ...
after Vasko Popa
Always ready to leave
leaving
each time further
from the whispers
of the grass.
She has forgotten
her death,
the calf she once was.
Curled around an arm
a new name sewn
into her mouth
she's been there, done that.
A tramp, living beyond
the stitches of life.
&n ...