Indrani Perera

poet, publisher & mentor

Month: August 2019

Poetry Challenge – Week Thirty-Four

Week 34 words from @thabani.tshuma: fever, dichotomy, warlock, evergreen and drywall.

if I was a wizard or a warlock

with spells shooting from my fingers

I would vanquish my doubts

and slay my demons

in a shower of sparks

instead I stack my insecurities

stone by stone to create

a drywall around my anger

and in the centre I plant

a tree, evergreen

is it a dichotomy to cultivate hope

in a paddock fenced with fear?

no.

it's an impossibility

~~~~

Here are the words and my poem for the thirty-fourth week of the 2019 Poetry Challenge.

I think this week's challenge was the hardest one yet. As soon as I read the word, dichotomy, I freaked out. I'm not sure what the opposite of anticipation is (dread maybe?) but whatever it is, I had it in spades. To me anticipation is a pleasurable event. Rather than anticipate the writing of this poem, I was actively avoiding it!

In hindsight the freaking out was the hardest part. It's so true for a lot of things in life – the dread is most often far worse then the actual event. Actually writing the poem was on a par with writing all the others for the challenge. The process of playing with words, connecting with emotions and trying to communicate meaning remained the same. Big thanks for Thabani for throwing me such a curveball and shaking things up!

If you want to join the 2019 Poetry Challenge, head on over to my Instagram account (@indraniperera) where I post the words for the week on Mondays (mostly) in my story. Write a poem and post it. Be sure to tag me and use the hashtags #2019poetrychallenge and #livepoetsclub.

If you don't want to write a poem, you can still be part of the 2019 Poetry Challenge. Send me five random words and I'll use them in a poem. Either DM me on Instagram with the words or send me an email (indrani at indraniperera dot com).

Happy writing!

August 30, 2019
Brushstrokes

Earlier this year I entered the Ros Spencer Poetry contest with my poem, Recipe for a Poem. It didn't win any awards but it was selected to be published in the anthology for the competition featuring poems from 2016-2019.

It's been a long time since I've had any poetry published (twenty-two years in fact *ahem*) and I'm so happy to have a poem published after such a long break. It feels like a sign from the muse that I am on the right track and that writing poetry is worthwhile.

Of course writing for it's own sake is always worthwhile and I will keep writing no matter what. Like writing this blog which I do mainly to express my thoughts and record my adventures in living a creative life. Not because I have to but because I want to and it brings me joy to create something with words and pictures. That said, it's nice to receive some external validation every once in a while. Keeps you going, you know?

WA Poets Inc have done a fabulous job with this anthology and I am super excited to have one of my very own poems featured in its pages.

August 28, 2019
Set It Free

I'm submitting a poem to an anthology with my publisher, Ginninderra Press. I have no idea if this poem will fit the theme of the anthology or catch the selector's eye. In short, I don't know if it's going to meet someone else's standards, fit with their vision or be worthy of inclusion.

It took me a couple of months to write the poem. And a couple of attempts with different subjects and settings. As I was writing the final version I suffered many anxieties. I found myself wanting to ask for someone else's opinion about the poem. Writing on your own is both liberating and isolating. It's the beautiful tension of being an author. You can say whatever you like but you never know if your words will reach someone else's ears and resonate with them in the way you hope.

Instead of asking for an opinion I sat with the feeling of anxiety. I got curious about it and where it came from. And the longer I let that feeling be, the more I realised it was my intuition or sixth sense or subconscious or whatever you want to call it, telling me the poem wasn't finished. Not yet. It still needed my care and attention. There were still things I needed to fix or improve. Things to change and to add. Things to remove.

And once I had done all that and satisfied my inner knowing, I didn't need to ask anyone for their opinion because I knew the poem was finished. I had said all I wanted to say in the best way possible. I was content.

And yet I still didn't send the poem in. The deadline is looming fast and the poem is still sitting on my hard drive. Because this is the hardest part. Not all the work I put into the poem. Not the grappling with my demons. No. The hardest part is in the letting go. Saying goodbye to my beautiful poem and sending it on its way. Not knowing if it will be received with open arms or impersonally rejected.

This act of letting go is one of tremendous faith and trust. Trust that whatever the outcome may be, it is the perfect outcome and I have done my best.

August 26, 2019
Poetry Challenge – Week Thirty-Three

Week 33 words from @emiliecollyer: cinnamon, ache, yesterday, fossil and tongue.

I've papered over the ache

with distractions and distance

sunshine searing my cinnamon skin

humidity gulping my moisture

I'm leagues from home

but the glue is still wet

and the discordance of yesterday

bubbles to the surface

I bury my grief deep in the sand

to harden and turn into a fossil

but it's sharp and spiky

and stabs me in the foot

with the spines of a sea urchin

salt on my tongue

~~~~

Here are the words and my poem for the thirty-third week of the 2019 Poetry Challenge.

It's been an eventful couple of weeks here in the tropical island paradise of Bali. Like all holidays, it hasn't quite gone according to plan and an extremely bad case of sunburn hampered my goal of having a massage every second day. However, these are minor inconveniences when you consider I am oceans from home and soaking up the sun instead of hugging the heater. And at least I managed to fit it into my poem!

If you want to join the 2019 Poetry Challenge, head on over to my Instagram account (@indraniperera) where I post the words for the week on Mondays (mostly) in my story. Write a poem and post it. Be sure to tag me and use the hashtags #2019poetrychallenge and #livepoetsclub.

If you don't want to write a poem, you can still be part of the 2019 Poetry Challenge. Send me five random words and I'll use them in a poem. Either DM me on Instagram with the words or send me an email (indrani at indraniperera dot com).

Happy writing!

August 23, 2019
Tropical Farming

It's been amazing to be on holiday, away from all the usual expectations and surrounded by new sights, scents and flavours. The highlight of our trip to Bali so far has been a visit to the Pande coffee plantation near Gunung Kawi. It's farmed by Agus and has been in his family for several generations. Narrow terraces are carved into the side of a hill growing an incredible mix of edible plants, not just coffee as we first thought. It reminded me of the farm we visited in Peru. Both so very different to Australia with our flat, flat farms stretching to the horizon.

It's a small scale organic farm with lots of different plants and animals. Everything here is interconnected and nothing is wasted. Manure from the cows is used as fertiliser. Empty plastic bottles have been built into a greenhouse. A log has been turned into a beehive. The pigs were the happiest I've ever seen and had the funniest faces.

We spent a happy couple of hours being led around the farm by Agus who is very knowledgeable about plants. I was so excited to see vanilla and patchouli plants along with coconut, durian, bamboo, jak fruit, papaya, banana, coffee (Arabica and robusta) and cacao. Agus broke open a ripe pod and we got to eat the zesty flesh around the cacao nib. Mmmm, delicious.

The herb garden was fabulous with lots of herbs I knew along with some I had never heard of. Agus told me all the names, gave me leaves to smell or taste and explained all their uses. I think my favourite herb was cat's whiskers. I wish I could remember what it did!

The real star of the farm, however, was patient and passionate Agus. His love and respect for the land were obvious and it was wonderful to spend time with someone so passionate about treading lightly on the earth.

August 21, 2019
The Wave

I'm having a moment of existential crisis and self doubt.

I'm despairing of ever writing a poem that will get published in a literary magazine.

The poems in literary journals are incredible. When I read the ones that have been accepted I feel so ordinary. It's my secret fear. Being ordinary. And I've no idea how to turn it into a weapon.

I don't know how to write clever poems an editor or selector will love. I just know how to put words together to fumble for a meaning or an emotion. To convey to a reader something of what I sense. Something important or true. Beautiful or kind.

The academic poems I read in journals leave me on the edge of tears. I don't know how to write like that. The words they use. The sentences and phrases they create. Their rhythm and line breaks. Their imaginative scenes. The sense of place and time they evoke. They way they show and don't tell. I only know how to tell my truth. I don't know how to wrap it inside a story. Their style is alien. Another language I'm unable to decode or decipher.

It's like they're all part of some club and I'm not a member because I don't know the password or the secret handshake. I've never studied poetry. I have only the briefest idea about the poetic classics. And its pretty obvious when you read my poetry.

When I read the journals and the poems accepted for publication I feel this great wave of grief rising. Salt threatening my shoddy and shaky foundations. It's overwhelming in its intensity.

And I think – what's the point? What's the bloody point in doing this?

August 19, 2019
Poetry Challenge – Week Thirty-Two

Week 32 words from @daia_gaia: belly, sacred ground, bones, truth and play.

how can I play

when not all truth

can be gleaned

from bleached bones

scattered over sacred ground

how can I rest

when not all lies

can be stomached

by belly distended

from false hope

and imperfect dreams

how?

~~~~

Here are the words and my poem for the thirty-second week of the 2019 Poetry Challenge.

When I first got these words I was really excited by their potential and the possibility that I might, just might, write a longer poem this week. Well I tried and had several goes but the poem is still fairly short I'm afraid. I'm actually on holiday in Bali at the moment so I've been a little distracted by the blue skies, warm weather and pool just outside my hotel room door. Perhaps next week?

If you want to join the 2019 Poetry Challenge, head on over to my Instagram account (@indraniperera) where I post the words for the week on Mondays (mostly) in my story. Write a poem and post it. Be sure to tag me and use the hashtags #2019poetrychallenge and #livepoetsclub.

If you don't want to write a poem, you can still be part of the 2019 Poetry Challenge. Send me five random words and I'll use them in a poem. Either DM me on Instagram with the words or send me an email (indrani at indraniperera dot com).

Happy writing!

August 16, 2019
Reading Now

I thought I'd share with you what I've got in my reading pile at the moment. I seem to be dipping in and out of a few books as the mood strikes me. I scored In Other Words by Jumpha Lairi at a books sale along with Leonard Cohen's Book of Longing. Impulse buys, I haven't done that for years – I've been a faithful library borrower and money saver instead.

I've been aware of Cohen on the periphery of things for a while now but am only just discovering his work after a fellow poet put me on to this excellent tribute of his life. His poetry has a style and density I'm not used to and find I need to read a single poem and sit with it for a while.

Lairi's book is in both Italian (the love of her life) and in English. Lairi wanted to learn Italian so she moved to Rome and only spoke and wrote Italian. She wrote this book in Italian about her experience and had someone else translate it into English. An incredible undertaking and fascinating story. She shares why she writes and what it means to her. She writes to understand the world and to make her existence. It lead me to think about why exactly I write. Why I feel compelled to spill ink and capture thoughts. I'm still mulling over it.

Of course there's always a stack of poetry books on the go. The current selection looks a little like this. But Is It Art? by David Munro, Footsteps by Greg Rochlin, Tailwind and Other Poems by Rohan White, Margin Doodles vol 1 by Waffle Iriongirl, Museum of Space by Peter Boyle and Hollowed Out Lungs by Joel McKerrow. Most of these titles are by authors I've met or heard speak. How lucky am I?

This list is a bit of a departure from my comfort reading of recent years. I'm starting to venutre once more into the terrain of difficult and challening. I'm relishing it!

What's on your reading list?

August 12, 2019
Poetry Challenge – Week Thirty-One

Week 31 words from @our_sacred_ordinary: endless, perspective, womb, distant and relationship.

shift your perspective

from all your endless tasks

to the present moment

and your relationship

with authenticity

hold out your tongue

and taste the air

open your ears

and hear the earth

turn your distant longing

into a womb

and nurture hope

~~~~

Here are the words and my poem for the thirty-first week of the 2019 Poetry Challenge.

As I sat down with this week's words to write a poem, I tapped into how I was feeling and what I might want to say / share. As I put pen to paper I started to feel stressed about getting it 'right'. I managed to realise what I was doing and reminded myself to enjoy the process of creating the poem rather than trying to force the result or rush the process. Changing my perspective made writing this poem fun.

If you want to join the 2019 Poetry Challenge, head on over to my Instagram account (@indraniperera) where I post the words for the week on Mondays (mostly) in my story. Write a poem and post it. Be sure to tag me and use the hashtags #2019poetrychallenge and #livepoetsclub.

If you don't want to write a poem, you can still be part of the 2019 Poetry Challenge. Send me five random words and I'll use them in a poem. Either DM me on Instagram with the words or send me an email (indrani at indraniperera dot com).

Happy writing!

August 9, 2019
Feeding the Fire

Over the last couple of months I've been sending off my poems to publishers and competitions. Only to receive silence in return. Being a writer can be a very disheartening experience. Working away for months, pouring your soul into your poetry only to have it rejected. Last Wednesday was particularly bad. Not only did I find out my poem wasn't good enough to make the short list for a major poetry prize I also discovered that I'd missed the deadline for another competition after spending ages working on my entry.

The cure? (Cos you know there's there's light even when all the stars go out). Spending a day at the Darebin Parklands in Alphington with my girls and a group of friends, making fire. We tried to get the fire going using a fire drill and managed to get an ember. Alas, it went out in our hastily made tinder bundle. Note to self – before starting fire remember to prepare tinder bundle and stick teepee in fire pit.

My thirteen year old daughter eventually got the fire going with a single match (some weeks we have used a lot of matches in our efforts to create and harness the warmth and comfort of fire). I then spent the next couple of hours feeding any dry sticks I could find into the flames. It was so therapeutic and healing to be spending the day outdoors, breathing in wood smoke.

What do you do to comfort yourself after disappointment hits?

August 5, 2019