States of Poetry - Poems

'Chips' by Ellen van Neerven | States of Poetry Queensland - Series One

by Ellen van Neerven •

States of Poetry Queensland - Series One

States of Poetry - Poems

'Chips' by Ellen van Neerven | States of Poetry Queensland - Series One

by Ellen van Neerven •

States of Poetry Queensland - Series One

Can I say
white people really bore me sometimes
to be exact
I grow tired with what's unmentioned
idling in surf club bathrooms
nothing wrong with the chips
but they're talking about Tasmania
my thoughts haunted by islands
maybe I'm dying
I've too many chips
teeth like stones
take me to be flossed
and cleaned
I need new soles
sticking to the floor
what is happening
with the dialogue of this country
they are killing people with words
if I'm not back soon
tell them I've had
too many chips

Ellen van Neerven

Recording

Ellen van Neerven

Ellen van Neerven (born in Meanjin (Brisbane) in 1990) is an award-winning writer and editor of Mununjali Yugambeh (South East Queensland) and Dutch heritage. Ellen’s first book, Heat and Light, was the recipient of the David Unaipon Award, the Dobbie Literary Award and the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Indigenous Writers Prize. Ellen’s second book, a collection of poetry, Comfort Food, was shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Kenneth Slessor Prize and highly commended for the 2016 Wesley Michel Wright Prize. Throat is Ellen’s second poetry collection, a May 2020 release.

(Photograph by Anna Jacobson)