To be
a derelict house
a piece of straw in a cow shed
a leaf on a lawn
a lawn lapsed into weed
the char at the bottom of a pan
a stymied plan to travel
a fiction disguised as fact, yes, a lie
an almost winning hand
a hand full of analgesics
a neurotic sheaf of poems
a performance of Brahms 1, definitely hard-won
a discarded bag of groceries in a car park
a love thief
an insomniac, then a heavy sleeper
a handsome prince
the woman I’ve become almost without wishing
a self as bare as morning looking for
a coat to walk out in
a switch-on moment, uncomfortable, plain
but true as an uneven path
Jill Jones’ latest book is How To Emerge (Vagabond Press, 2025). Her previous book, Acrobat Music: New & Selected Poems, was short-listed for the 2024 John Bray Poetry Prize, long-listed for the 2024 ALS Gold Medal and commended in the 2023 Wesley Michel Wright Prize. Her work has been widely published in most of the leading literary periodicals in Australia as well as in a number of print and online magazines in New Zealand, Canada, the USA, Britain, the Czech Republic, France and India. She edited, with Michael Farrell, Out of the Box: Contemporary Australian Gay and Lesbian Poets.
My social media tags are:
Facebook: Jill Jones
Instagram: jill_jones__
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