With a phrase from Franz Wright’s ‘Another Working Dawn’
you’re dreaming still : soaring high above an endless city : your view
slantwise : your back to the dawning sun : the streets are empty :
the high-wires knotted with pigeons : you’re dreaming still :
of absent friends : of your own domestic library : its drowsy aroma :
the piles of weighty hardcovers you’ve acquired : there’s nothing
for it : but to turn yourself out into the streets : post-boxes
gagging junk mail : newspapers lying at the streetsides : unexploded :
even the notorious guard-dogs, the most predictably vehement
of them, have developed inhibitions in the night : which means
nothing : you’re dreaming still : meat-hooks in the soft ham
of your ankles : scraping the pavement : a dreadful rasp : that wakes
the neighbours : that wakes the whole indecent postcode :
clammy in their bed-sheets : from their dreamless sleep :
or sleepless dreams : one way or another, they’re dreaming still :
late night programming flickering inside their eyelids : station ads :
infotainment : the exposed breast they didn’t kiss : aged sixteen :
that wakens them : with a hankering for pavlova : it doesn’t matter :
you’re streets away : in an avenue of enthusiastic bottlebrush :
that sheds its eyelashes onto your shoulders : where some ghost :
some lost child or teen suicide : agitates a swing in the soldiers’
memorial gardens : rattling its chains : with a lightness that counters
the heft of gravity : its tension on the swing : its catenary fullness :
puddles in the gutters shiver : attuned to some resonance
beneath your hearing : suffering it like a skin : some gristle
in the teeth of the fault-line : on a corner a broken bird : dishevelled :
its eyes screwed shut : it’s dreaming still : wheeling high above
this vast suburbia : paved with rooftops : its view slantwise :
far beyond the curvature of the earth :
- 115: SPACE
with A Sometimes
114: NO THEME 13
with J Toledo & C Tse
113: INVISIBLE WALLS
with A Walker & D Disney
112: TREAT
with T Dearborn
111: BABY
with S Deo & L Ferney
110: POP!
with Z Frost & B Jessen
109: NO THEME 12
with C Maling & N Rhook
108: DEDICATION
with L Patterson & L Garcia-Dolnik
107: LIMINAL
with B Li
106: OPEN
with C Lowe & J Langdon
105: NO THEME 11
with E Grills & E Stewart
104: KIN
with E Shiosaki
103: AMBLE
with E Gomez and S Gory
102: GAME
with R Green and J Maxwell
101: NO THEME 10
with J Kinsella and J Leanne
100: BROWNFACE
with W S Dunn
99: SINGAPORE
with J Ip and A Pang
97 & 98: PROPAGANDA
with M Breeze and S Groth
96: NO THEME IX
with M Gill and J Thayil
95: EARTH
with M Takolander
94: BAYT
with Z Hashem Beck
93: PEACH
with L Van, G Mouratidis, L Toong
92: NO THEME VIII
with C Gaskin
91: MONSTER
with N Curnow
90: AFRICAN DIASPORA
with S Umar
89: DOMESTIC
with N Harkin
88: TRANSQUEER
with S Barnes and Q Eades
87: DIFFICULT
with O Schwartz & H Isemonger
86: NO THEME VII
with L Gorton
85: PHILIPPINES
with Mookie L and S Lua
84: SUBURBIA
with L Brown and N O'Reilly
83: MATHEMATICS
with F Hile
82: LAND
with J Stuart and J Gibian
81: NEW CARIBBEAN
with V Lucien
80: NO THEME VI
with J Beveridge
57.1: EKPHRASTIC
with C Atherton and P Hetherington
57: CONFESSION
with K Glastonbury
56: EXPLODE
with D Disney
55.1: DALIT / INDIGENOUS
with M Chakraborty and K MacCarter
55: FUTURE MACHINES
with Bella Li
54: NO THEME V
with F Wright and O Sakr
53.0: THE END
with P Brown
52.0: TOIL
with C Jenkins
51.1: UMAMI
with L Davies and Lifted Brow
51.0: TRANSTASMAN
with B Cassidy
50.0: NO THEME IV
with J Tranter
49.1: A BRITISH / IRISH
with M Hall and S Seita
49.0: OBSOLETE
with T Ryan
48.1: CANADA
with K MacCarter and S Rhodes
48.0: CONSTRAINT
with C Wakeling
47.0: COLLABORATION
with L Armand and H Lambert
46.1: MELBOURNE
with M Farrell
46.0: NO THEME III
with F Plunkett
45.0: SILENCE
with J Owen
44.0: GONDWANALAND
with D Motion
43.1: PUMPKIN
with K MacCarter
43.0: MASQUE
with A Vickery
42.0: NO THEME II
with G Ryan
41.1: RATBAGGERY
with D Hose
41.0: TRANSPACIFIC
with J Rowe and M Nardone
40.1: INDONESIA
with K MacCarter
40.0: INTERLOCUTOR
with L Hart
39.1: GIBBERBIRD
with S Gory
39.0: JACKPOT!
with S Wagan Watson
38.0: SYDNEY
with A Lorange
37.1: NEBRASKA
with S Whalen
37.0: NO THEME!
with A Wearne
36.0: ELECTRONICA
with J Jones