Watchers

The heather covers Brandon hill, in a flaming purple haze,

An impish figure with big green eyes, sits with a smile upon his…

Have you ever stepped under a rainbow, or spent days walking all alone,

Watched the mighty eagle soar high above, as it finds its way back home,

Listened to the whispering of the trees, telling their secrets of long ago,

Try to see your future in the dying embers, as the flames are getting low.

Would you ride a stallion pure and graceful, beside an ocean dark and deep,

And dance with the spirits of your ancestors, to ancient music as you sleep,

Swim beside the…

I met him one night in a drunken haze, down a dark alley having a smoke,

He stepped out of the shadows and asked for a light, a sad looking sort of bloke,

In between the swearing and spitting on the ground, he started to sing a song,

His words cut me straight to the bone, and then I asked him where he came from.

I am the product he says; of generations of fools, of wise men and skillful liars,

Of brave men and women that died for a cause, stirred up by political…

 Down here we whisper to each other, our bodies a pile of twisted broken bones,

Our souls crying out for justice in the darkness, our only crime was to be born,

Ireland of our faithful Fathers and Mothers, our religion our guidance and our light,

How we shamed you by our mere existence, dirty little secrets to be kept out of sight.

Your own flesh and blood excommunicated, to serve those that may look over your fence,

Then all the lies and cover up stories, never once…

Can you hear that pitty noise???

It could be his freezing voice...

...

My head just want to blow up once,

and the presure will make my trance... 

 In the early hours of September 1, 1983, Major Gennady Osipovich in a Su-15 missile equipped jet fighter of the Soviet air force took off from Dolinsk-Sokol Airfield on the island of Sakhalin to fly into history and into infamy and to intercept an unidentified aircraft that had penetrated Soviet air space. His unnamed partner was flying a MiG 23.

The unidentified aircraft was a KAL South Korean airline Boeing 747 – 200B flight KE007 from New York to Seoul via…

The story of the limerick, the carrier of much folklore, may itself be folklore. Although some researchers assert that this form of rhyme was in use in the golden Grecian years, 448 to 380BC. The great Greek dramatist Aristophanes had a good hand at the terse verse.



Pre-eminent in the 'Old Comedy' genre, he was a brilliantly intelligent conservative with the greatest contempt for democracy. He despised the establishment dramatists. In 'The Frogs' he savaged several of them.…

The severing of heads in moments of heightened excitement plays an intriguing part in the annals of the Welsh folk culture. This must seriously shine a light on the foibles of the Celts who lived in Wales in ancient times. Many may recall…

I met him for the first time in the early summer of 1963. I was walking, guitar case in hand, to my appointed busking position. I was in no great hurry. Respectable street-musicians don't rush anywhere, especially not on sunny days, and certainly not in Paris.

He had a collection of sketches of famous people set out along the wall on the river bank. I remember that day and him very clearly. His big brown…

Easter is a period packed with custom and ritual. How could it not be so? It is, after all, another one of those marvellous pagan revels, snitched from the 'Old Religions' and put to jolly good use by the cunning, dastardly, and commercially aware Christians. 'Life is a cavalcade, old chum' someone said.

Even the name of this festival shows its heathen origin. Easter comes from Eastre, or Eostre. She was, still is perhaps, the Anglo-Saxon Goddess of spring and dawn.…

Ken Taylor, poet, and one of the founding members of the La Mama Poetry workshops and readings died last week on 2 April. Ken was the author of At Valentines: Poems 1966-1969, A Secret Australia: Selected and New Poems (1975) and Africa (2000) which went on to win the Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry in 2001.

Ken’s funeral will be held on Thursday 10 April at 10am at St Luke’s Church South Melbourne, followed by reception at Albert…

Ariel Riveros Pavez on P76 Issue 7 (Special Cornelis Vleeskens Issue)



"wow this is a beautiful piece of publishing, poetry, visual poetry, homage, art etc a joyous experience for me



LOVE!



My own thanks as reader to Mark Roberts of Rochford Street Review, the eloquent and hardworking poet and visual poetry curator Pete Spence and to a crackling, living body of poetry of someone I only met this year in…

Memory Weaving, a collection of intriguing and poignant poems on dementia journeys, is well worth a read. I have a  poem in it entitled A Tip. My thanks to ed. Carolyn Vimpani. LJ 

There was a time when I travelled the valleys of South Wales quite extensively. I have clear, sometimes dramatic, memories of battling both the roads and the elements. I remember Rhymney, Llanilleth, Cwm, Ebbw Vale, Brecon Beacons, Merthyr Tydfil, Bryn-Mawr, Black Mountain and the Heads of the Valley Road.

Sitting in the quiet of the local library,

I seek enlightenment in an antediluvian

on-loan tome, available to own only

from a mail-order book…

The Southern Highlands Poetry Anthology - featuring poetry by Mark Tredinnick, Jennifer Compton, Peter Lach-Newinsky, Dave Dowsett and I - will be launched on Tuesday 18th February at 5pm at the Council Theatrette, Moss Vale. Peter Lach-Newinsky, Dave Dowsett and I will be reading our work from the Anthology. It would be great to see you there. LJ

Latest from Rochford Street review: The Ultimate Commitment: The Poetry of Michael Dransfield, Vicki Viidikas and Robert Harris by Robert Adamson…

If you go here: http://j.mp/LWdla8 you can read my account of using the Rare Books and Special Collections at Fisher Library, University of Sydney. I can highly recommend them. It is open and available to the public, staff are very knowledgable and friendly, and it's a treasure trove of inspiration.

I wrote ‘Memories Clear – Images of Holmfirth’ as a result of researching ‘Questions In Time’ a journal article for the magazine ‘Open Writing’.  The focus of the article being the traditional choral folksong ‘The Holmfirth Anthem’- a long-time favourite of mine, and others - the research, started in the days of the floppy disc and completed in the digital everything age was long overdue. The town of Holmfirth overlooks the Holm Valley in the West Yorkshire…

Happy New Year to all. May 2014 be a fruitful year of writing for everyone. Peace n light, LJ.