Michele Leggott



haemopoiesis

sunshine99 welcome to the holy island they ask a lot of questions and use words like apheresis and tetany on the wall a wetland scene portal into memory someone laughs and takes blood from my neck someone sings the body …

Posted in 106: OPEN | Tagged

Brigid Magner Reviews Michele Leggott’s Vanishing Points and Elizabeth Smither’s Night Horse

Michelle Leggott and Elizabeth Smither are both former Poet Laureates, with distinguished careers behind them. Night Horse won the poetry category of the 50th Ockham New Zealand Book Awards and Vanishing Points has already been received to great acclaim. Even though there are some major stylistic differences between these two books, there are many surprising coincidences.

Posted in BOOK REVIEWS | Tagged , ,

mensa / the table

lay me on the table and remove the child whose feet walked up my belly under northern stars to kiss the fish at new year lay me on the table and remove the child born under southern stars the summer …

Posted in 71: TOIL | Tagged

The Fascicles

In darkness, redcoats marching out to the Pekapeka block. It cannot be true. But imagine for a moment it is. Two women stand almost in the same place which is the rim of an old volcano.

Posted in 69: TRANSTASMAN | Tagged

Trans-Tasman: Book Reviews and Best New Zealand Poetry 2013

It’s 2014. Time to expand / add to the Trans-Tasman conversation on poetics between Australia and New Zealand. The Best New Zealand Poems 2013 has now been published. Online only. Check it out. Congratulation to Murray Edmond, Anne Kennedy and …

Posted in GUNCOTTON | Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

Review Short: Beyond the Ohlala Mountains: Alan Brunton, Poems 1968-2002

The mask on the cover of ‘Beyond the Ohlala Mountains’ suggests that there’ll be some odd theatrics inside the book. It’s a plain papier-mâché mask of a slightly jowly head with a bulbous nose and a pair of puckered, pouting, full red lips. What does it express – is it a superior sneer? Is it bourgeois disdain? Is it about to say ‘oh là là’? The mask was made by Sally Rodwell, the now-deceased partner of the New Zealand poet collected here, Alan Brunton. It was made for a theatre work called Cabaret of the Unlikely that was performed three years after Brunton had died at 55, in 2002.

Posted in BOOK REVIEWS | Tagged , , ,

NZ 6-Seater: A Chapbook Curated by Ian Wedde

Invited by Kent MacCarter to convene a 6-seater of local poets from this neck of the Pacific woods – New Zealand – I faced the usual short list of questions we all try to avoid answering:

1. What do you mean, ‘local’?
2. What do you mean, ‘Pacific’?
3. Can I invite my friends?

Posted in CHAPBOOKS | Tagged , , , , , ,

experiments (our life together)

here is my experiment with the dark we run to the top of the street and crossing it become aware of the fountain’s lip and mosaics under water pink blue hyaline we step through the foot bath yes the gold …

Posted in SIX SEATER | Tagged ,