Indrani Perera

poet, publisher & mentor

Category: Poetry

Phone-A-Poem

I caught the train into town this morning for a flying visit to the Melbourne Writers Festival and to track down the phones scattered throughout the venues for the event. These are no ordinary phones. Not only are they totally retro with that rotary dial that would make you start the painstaking process of phoning again if you dialled the wrong number (eighties kids you know what I'm talking about) they are completely cool because they are filled with poems!

Yes, you read right. Dial a number on one of these babies and you'll hear a poem read by a poet with a connection to regional Victoria. I'm proud to say that you can hear my poem, Far Flung Seeds, on one of these phones! I wrote this poem about spending time at my grandparents' house in Jeparit, in the Wimmera Mallee. The population here is always around four hundred, it's flat and dry and it has a firm place in my heart.

Huge thanks to Red Room Poetry for commissioning my poem for this project, to Izzy Roberts-Orr for adding the awesome soundscape and to the Melbourne Writers festival for hosting these amazing phones!

May 10, 2025
Entrance

barricade yourself

contain, section, cordon this

scale wires, impale.

Posting as @indraniperera on Instagram, this is the second poem in my new series of haiku x photography; poems + photos series. If you want to join in the fun, tag me and use the hashtag #haikuinthreeparts.

A haiku is a short Japanese poetry form of three lines where the first line contains five syllables, the second line has seven syllables and the third and final line has five syllables. Typically, there's also a turn, a shift or change in mood or tone between the second and third lines. It's seems deceptively easy but the challenge is conveying what you mean with as few words as possible. Traditionally haikus were written about nature by Japanese haiku masters such as Basho.

May 24, 2023
Flâneur

crisp edges softened

by rain. stepped on by leather

final resting place.

Posting as @indraniperera on Instagram, this is the first poem in my new series of haiku x photography; poems + photos series. If you want to join in the fun, tag me and use the hashtag #haikuinthreeparts.

If you are curious about the title of this poem, Wikipedia says: ‘Flâneur is a French noun referring to a person, literally meaning “stroller”, “lounger”, “saunterer”, or “loafer”, but with some nuanced additional meanings. Flânerie is the act of strolling, with all of its accompanying associations. A near-synonym of the noun is boulevardier.’

May 6, 2023
Yet Still I Live

Yet still I live

though wax moons shine

and shed tears of blood

causing the shadow of the goddess

to fall like rain

upon my face

The primal chant wells in my soul

the symphony rising

in my drumming blood

her language coming unbidden

to the tongue

the essential worship beginning now

Flashback to my first book of poetry, Defenestration, published in 1997. Now back in print.

~~~

Defenestration, my book of poetry, was launched in July 1997. I invited everyone I knew. Kaf made divine nibblies, my dad helped get in the wine and Stephen turned up with a crate of books. I told him to bring a lot. He was dubious. Poetry isn't a big seller and not many books are sold at launches. I insisted, politely. He obliged, kindly.

The night was awesome. We packed out a room at Gorman House in Canberra. Stephen launched my book and I read some poems. He sold 96 put of the 100 copies he had brought along with him. Almost half my 200 copy print run!

After my book was published, I suffered second book syndrome. It’s the one where you question everything you write before you even put pen to paper. Will people like it? Is it good enough? Will anyone get upset? When you write in anonymity you write what you want. When the spotlight is on, it gets hot.

Then everyone started asking when the next book was coming out. They were only being polite, making small talk but I froze. And the writing dwindled away to nothing…

May 13, 2019
There Were No Fireworks

There were no fireworks

no starbursts of red, green and yellow

no rockets of magnificent blue

and yet love came knocking

There were animated conversations

sharing of hopes and dreams

deepening of a friendship

and still love came knocking

There was the first tender kiss

the exquisite exploring of another's body

the heights of passion

and love came knocking

There was no discussion of tomorrow

for tomorrow had no place here

and before I could open the door to love

you were gone

Flashback to my first book of poetry, Defenestration, published in 1997. Now back in print.

~~~

At the time Ginninderra Press accepted my poetry I was working in a government job in the statistcs department so I had plenty of time to edit my book. It was so long ago that when I gave my manuscript to my publisher, it was on a floppy disk. (What's that? Yes exactly). The disk caused his whole computer to crash. Luckily we eventually figured out the technology.

I asked my friend Jan who drew the most incredible pictures if she had something I could use for the cover of my book. She let me go through her drawings and I picked the amazing illustration that is on the cover of Defenestration, my book of poetry.

April 29, 2019
On West 46 and Broadway

On West 46 and Broadway

there's newly matyred Christians

selling salvation

whilst kitty-cornered across the road

the devil sells damnation

for only the price of your soul

And it's kinda weird

how there's always a crowd

around Beelzebub's limo

whilst people avoid the gazes

of God's honest foot soldiers

Flashback to my first book of poetry, Defenestration, published in 1997. Now back in print.

~~~

Luckily for me as part of the ‘Getting Published' course I did in the 1990s, I had the chance to show my work to the teacher, Stephen Matthews of Ginninderra Press. He kindly offered to assess it and let us know if we had a chance of being published by a major publishing house. Sadly for all aspiring authors, publishers get far too many unsolicited manuscripts (the slush pile) to be able to offer any feedback. I grabbed the chance with both hands.

When Stephen handed back my poetry and asked if there were any more, enough to make a collection I was gobsmacked. Not only did he think my poems were good enough to publish, he was going to publish them!!! My name. On the cover. Of a real book!

March 27, 2019
On West 46 and Broadway

On West 46 and Broadway

there's newly matyred Christians

selling salvation

whilst kitty-cornered across the road

the devil sells damnation

for only the price of your soul

And it's kinda weird

how there's always a crowd

around Beelzebub's limo

whilst people avoid the gazes

of God's honest foot soldiers

Flashback to my first book of poetry, Defenestration, published in 1997. Now back in print.

~~~

Luckily for me as part of the ‘Getting Published' course I did in the 1990s, I had the chance to show my work to the teacher, Stephen Matthews of Ginninderra Press. He kindly offered to assess it and let us know if we had a chance of being published by a major publishing house. Sadly for all aspiring authors, publishers get far too many unsolicited manuscripts (the slush pile) to be able to offer any feedback. I grabbed the chance with both hands.

When Stephen handed back my poetry and asked if there were any more, enough to make a collection I was gobsmacked. Not only did he think my poems were good enough to publish, he was going to publish them!!! My name. On the cover. Of a real book!

March 27, 2019
Drive

the stench of sun baked seaweed, midday

and rotting fish, three weeks

fills my nostrils

as I speed through the red light

~~~

The above words are an excerpt from Drive, one of my latest poems.

Quite apt given my recent road trip undertaken on very hot summer days. Luckily for me I hired a car with air conditioning so we didn't cook on the drive like the seaweed in the poem.

Let me know what you think of the poem in the comments below.

March 18, 2019
Drive

the stench of sun baked seaweed, midday

and rotting fish, three weeks

fills my nostrils

as I speed through the red light

~~~

The above words are an excerpt from Drive, one of my latest poems.

Quite apt given my recent road trip undertaken on very hot summer days. Luckily for me I hired a car with air conditioning so we didn't cook on the drive like the seaweed in the poem.

Let me know what you think of the poem in the comments below.

March 18, 2019
I’m An Impostor

I'm an impostor
dressed in someone else's clothes
as I rifle through her wardrobe

I wonder who the hell she really was

And everyone who knew her
says they know me
and they confuse the two of us
for each other

And as soon as they open their mouths
to utter those fateful words
they condemn me to living
that girl's life

And I beat against the glass
a moth ineffectually trying
to find a way out
a way out of that room

A room that should be comforting
and familiar
but has become alien nonetheless

A life that goes on around me
whether I want it to or not
sucked into that maelstrom
drawn inexorably back into the mundane

And the bars of gold that imprison me
have lost their allure
and I can't find anyone
anyone
who seems to care
that I'm an impostor
dressed in someone else's clothes

Flashback to my first book of poetry, Defenestration, published in 1997. Now back in print.

~~~

My childhood dream of becoming a writer never died. Unliketheone where I was a paediatrician and cured all the sick children. I eventually figured out I wasn’t dedicated enough to spend all my time studying. There was too much life to experience! However, my dream of becoming a published author with my name on the cover of a book survived. I’ve always wanted to be able to go into a bookshop and see my name on the shelves.

When I lived in Canberra I did an evening class after work at the local college. The course was called ‘Getting Published' and the teacher was Stephen Matthews. Stephen had worked in the book world and had just stared Ginninderra Press, his independent publishing company. By doing the course I discovered it was almost impossible to get published by a publishing house. Still very true today but luckily it's much easier to find an audience as an author. Thank you internet!

February 4, 2019