Paola Bilbrough



Paola Bilbrough Reviews Andy Kissane

Just as there are two poetic sensibilities, Every Night They Dance is in a sense two books. The poems in Part 1 are dramatic monologues with Kissane slipping easily into a range of different voices and skins: Arthur Streeton, a suffragette, a Kanak, a colonial farm girl who saves the life of an Aboriginal man, various nineteenth century workers and others. In a particularly long poem, The Ghosts of Marrickville Metro, the essence of a job is captured beautifully in the choice of language and rhythm:

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Canvastown

That spring we lived in Canvastown there were mushrooms the size of dinner plates in the fields, frayed at the gills with lice. My mother wore a feather in her hair, naked, in profile, always painting. My father, stringy pony …

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Bell Tongue

Shingle under sole, walking over Silvermine shore with Shelley. She says with sorrow: ā€˜Iā€™m not a detail person.ā€™ Ferry to Lantau Island, each of us mistook the time and destination yet we still meet. Beneath fog thick as curds, the …

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