34-37 Degrees South - 2023
This anthology from the South Coast Writers Centre presents fresh country poetry from emerging and award-winning local writers.
This anthology from the South Coast Writers Centre presents fresh country poetry from emerging and award-winning local writers.
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After the fires, January 2020<br />
Melanie Weckert<br />
Grey tree fringes on the silent hill-corpse<br />
sprout from the pelt of fire slaughtered slopes.<br />
Once green—grasses, bushes, trees<br />
teeming with power and life<br />
the rustle of echidnas, lyre birds, skinks.<br />
Now silent, the brittle charcoaled limbs<br />
the wombat burrows of burnt flesh<br />
singed fur<br />
bones<br />
feathers<br />
beaks.<br />
I recall the agony through aching eyes<br />
of black carcasses plunged from burning sky.<br />
Now, dense undergrowth over hill contours consumed<br />
so bright rocks show through burnt soil skin<br />
above, a lone black cockatoo squeals,<br />
Gone<br />
Gone<br />
Gone.<br />
8
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