If it were me who bit that chunk out of the moon, would I glow from the inside like a firefly? ** From the inside like a firefly who bit that chunk out of the moon. Would I glow if it were me? ** Who bit that chunk out of the moon? Would I glow … Continue reading The Firefly →

(A thank you to V) We walk & talk until she stops beside a flower to smell or gently touch. Or to trace patterns & colourations in bark (have you seen the hieroglyphs on a scribbly gum?) ** Sometimes beneath a gnarly tree she stands & ponders reading stories of historic kinship with indigenous people … Continue reading When I get home, I am singing. →

(The Rabbit Hole is a podcast produced by the New York Times. Definitely worth a listen.) So there's this French guy, right. He has a university degree in Artificial Intelligence. He's smart and he does well. He gets offered a job at a big well known tech firm in Silicon Valley. He's proud as punch … Continue reading Story from The Rabbit Hole →

We found ourselves in the sun beside the lake with its glinting horizontal lines. The grass was green and soft and the blossom trees sent breaths of white tumbler-petals harmlessly among the seated every time the casuarinas sighed. We are here to remember my grandfather among the petals and the singing and the mellow clang … Continue reading A re-work of At the Peace Bell →

COVID has spread the annual spring flower festival like seeds across the city. Tulips on street corners guarded by raggedy scarecrows, pansies posing brightly at busy intersections or window boxes brought to rainbow life outside public buildings. There are no rides this year or crafty stalls or fragrant food trucks ** And yet the joy … Continue reading Floriade →

It's a nosebag.Excuse me?It's a digital nosebag.What are you talking about?News feed. Google feed. Facebook feed... that thing you're holding is a modern nosebag.I believe normal people call it a device or a phone.Well some people call a spade a blooming shovel. What difference does it make? It's a nosebag.You are so annoying. Can you … Continue reading On the bus… →

The PM, bless his buttocks, believes in gas. But a few people (well quite a lot) are wrinkling their noses and trying to get out of Scotty's lift. ** What problem is he solving? ** Not price we Aussies are paying through the nose. ** Not supply. 1000megawatts? (Gezundheit) That's what he wants on tap, … Continue reading Beaten by a nose… →

I say: "Our two roosters seem to be quite good friends." He says: "Yes. They've established a hierarchy. They all know their place. That's what's so good about chooks." We used to know our places too. Not anymore. So I say: "Yeah. None of this feminism stuff." I'm laughing. As a woman I can do … Continue reading Progress in the Chicken House →

(inspired by James Rebanks' interview with Richard Fidler) I picture an old man - a farmer - perhaps a little bent perhaps with eyes so faded the blue itself is a memory. He is like a river-mouth the collected silt of decades' knowledge about the earth and seasons' ebb and flow deposited in his brain. … Continue reading A Herdwick Shepherd →

a petal from a spring blossom drifts up white, almost iridescent in the angled light and disappears above the balcony roof. ** the cat eases down shoulder first to the carved wood belly golden ripe for the sun one paw in elegant outstretch. ** even the puppy lies quiet, a flat white, you could say, … Continue reading Fore & Aft →