States of Poetry - Poems

'Choir Practice' by James Charlton | States of Poetry Tasmania - Series Two

by James Charlton •

States of Poetry Tasmania - Series Two

States of Poetry - Poems

'Choir Practice' by James Charlton | States of Poetry Tasmania - Series Two

by James Charlton •

States of Poetry Tasmania - Series Two

A priest undoes his belt.
Twenty years later,
I compare his gentleness
to a Tibetan sky burial.
But there was only one vulture
skeletonising the cadaver
on a barren slope.

James Charlton

James Charlton

James Charlton graduated from the University of Tasmania, and from Flinders University and the University of Cambridge. He was Poetry Editor of Island magazine and Advisory Editor for Australasia of Chautauqua Literary Journal, published in upstate New York. Charlton earned his PhD from the University of Tasmania and his MA from the University of Cambridge. He is a poet and theological writer with an interest in transformative spiritual knowledge and experience, across traditions. His latest book, from Bloomsbury Publishing, is Non-dualism in Eckhart, Julian of Norwich and Traherne (2012).