Melinda Smith

States of Poetry 2017 - ACT | 'Some trees' by Melinda Smith

States of Poetry ACT - Series Two • 22 February 2016

some trees spotted gumtall classy ladycradling a listing turpentine (shaggy old top-heavybarrel-chested nuisance)she props him takes the strainholds her own line almost truethat’s what you get when you getmarried in a windstormbut the wind always changes strands you in strange attitudeslet him slide girlnext big storm he’ll take you both downand if the weather holdsthose bastards can liv ... (read more)

States of Poetry 2017 - ACT | 'Hammam' by Melinda Smith

States of Poetry ACT - Series Two • 22 February 2016

Hammam (translated from a Persian ghazal by Rabi’a Balkhi) I am back, locked up in this love again,all my daring escapes end here. Love is a broad shoreless seatell me, o wise ones, who swims it and lives? To take love all the wayyou must embrace every horror; adore ugliness like a fair face;make sweet delight of poison. I bucked like an unbroken mare; I did not know:the harder you pull, t ... (read more)

States of Poetry 2017 - ACT | 'What you get when you search for silence' by Melinda Smith

States of Poetry ACT - Series Two • 22 February 2016

What you get when you search for silence (poem composed of Hansard search results from November 1962) one of his colleagues has gone into a significant silenceto silence us, but this is having no effect listen in silencespoken and heard in silence the Prime Minister has observed an unusual silence on this matter. There was an old Australian play, written many years ago, called “The Silence o ... (read more)

States of Poetry 2017 - ACT | 'submergence' by Melinda Smith

States of Poetry ACT - Series Two • 22 February 2016

submergence I was all angle oncesharp and schist-likea spiked rock dragon-backarching into air too late you learn    the longwash of days    given grist enoughfinds your fissureschafes them    wide these days   knowing    I wadein a rising tide    of blonde    of blandwhen my time comesI will degrade  ... (read more)

States of Poetry 2017 - ACT | 'The Undiscovered Country' by Melinda Smith

States of Poetry ACT - Series Two • 22 February 2016

The Undiscovered Country When an exasperated soultears itself from its own bodyMinos condemns it to the seventh abyss. It falls into the forest, lands nowhere special -wherever Fortune casts it, and thereit germinates, like a dropped grain of spelt....The leaves here are not green, but some colourdrained of light; the branches not lithe, but gnarled,knotted to each other, bearing no fruit but po ... (read more)