by Indrani Perera
sun kissed
skin
sting
wind whipped
hair
blind
rock wrecked
feet
pierced
wave washed
body
wham!
burnt, messy
dirty, salty
breathless
– here
Listen to the audio recording here:
Summer Alive by Indrani Perera
This poem appears in Pas De Deux, Indrani Perera’s second collection of poetry.
There's a thrill that comes when you see your words in print and your name on the cover of a book. There's also a deep sense of satisfaction and completion. You've managed to get your book this far and now it's ready to go out into the world and meet new people. I wonder if they will be friendly…
As a writer, I am looking for an audience; a reader to complete my work and connect with my words, thoughts and ideas. To dance with them as they dip into the pages. Most things I do come back to connection and writing is no different. It's just another way I can connect with the people and the world around me by sharing the things that I notice.
All I've said so far is true but creatively speaking, I said goodbye to the poems in this collection a long time ago. I still perform my favourites on stage at open mics but there are many pieces in here that I have forgotten about. However, now that I have a copy to flick through and pore over, I am looking forward to finding forgotten gems. Some of these poems were written over three years ago and opening the pages to see them again is a little like seeing an old friend after many years apart. I wonder if we will still have things in common or if we will get on?
A big thank you to everyone who attended the launch of Pas De Deux, last night and made it such a success.
Here's just one of the comments from last night's chat:
'Absolutely gorgeous. I love your words, and your voice – there’s nothing like hearing you read your work yourself…. Encore!' Sue Totterdell
An especial thank you to the lovely Caz Masel who launched the book and said so many nice things about it. I loved listening to Caz read some of my poems and I got a kick of hearing her compare me to Samuel Taylor Coleridge. High praise!
And of course a huge thank you must go to Stephen Matthews at Ginninderra Press who published Pas De Deux, my second collection of poetry. I am forever in Stephen's debt for first publishing the young, aspiring poet Indrani Perera (late last century as my girls like to remind me!) and for continuing to believe in my poetry, twenty-three years later.
An honorary mention must also go to Joan Fenney, editor of the journal The Crow, who battled tech issues to finally join the zoom.
If you'd like to purchase a copy of Pas De Deux or my previous collection, Defenestration, head on over to the Ginninderra Press website or visit Book Depository. You can also get your hands on electronic version if you prefer digital.
It’s incredible to finally have actual, physical copies of my book instead of peering at proofs on a screen. To be able to hold it in my hands and flip through the pages. And you know, to see my name on the cover.
Designing the cover and getting it right was a big process. I went through many ideas before this final version. I knew I wanted a drawing of a bird, a welcome swallow in fact, but finding the image was a challenge. It turns out there aren't too many pictures of welcome swallows in the public domain!
In the end I ended up drawing it myself which meant learning to use a new, open source program to create the image. First I drew the bird on paper, then loaded it on to the computer and finally I traced around it. I'm sure there's an easier way to do it but as a beginner in drawing on a computer this is what worked for me.
Like most things it took way longer than anticipated but I think that it was well worth all the effort!
Hint: it's not a cat…
I'm an old fashioned gal at heart. I adore vintage furniture and ephemera like suitcases, hat boxes, shoe lasts, tie clips and butter knives with bone handles. I also haver a thing for graphic design so it made perfect sense to combine these two loves and create a postcard to send to friends and family for the upcoming launch of Pas De Deux, my second collection of poetry.
I've recently become a bit of a font geek and have been obsessing over the best typefaces to use for my designs. I'm still not 100% sure of the distinction between a typeface and font even after reading the excellent book Just My Type by Simon Garfield which I got for Christmas last year. Designing the invitation for my launch, however, was a breeze because I just had to use the fonts which I had already used for the cover of the book itself. For those of you interested in such arcane, matters I used Playfair Display for the heading and Montserrat Classic for the sub headings. I set the text on the back in Bodoni FLF.
It was great to sit down with my address book, a pile of postcards and some stamps and write out all the invitations. And then of course the fun of opening up that great big red box and putting the postcards inside. Isn't it marvellous that all you have to do is stick on a stamp and then your letter gets taken all around the world?
My second collection of poetry, Pas De Deux, has been published by Gininderra Press and you’re invited to the online launch via Zoom at 7pm on Tuesday 30th March 2021. If you can make it, please RSVP by 23 March 2021 to hello@indraniperera.com with “YES” in the subject line.
7.00 pm
Tuesday 30th March 2021
Zoom: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/6014563938
Copies of the book are $22.50 (plus $5.00 for postage and packaging for Australian orders). If you’d like to pre-order a copy to have at the launch, I’ll happily post one out to you. Just let me know when you RSVP that you’d like a copy (and let me know if you’d like it signed!). Once you’ve paid, I’ll mail out your copy.
by Indrani Perera
there’s this thing
it happens in brilliant poems
where you’re listening
or reading the words
swept up in the imagery
of a slide curving and swerving
from the top of a treehouse
to the bottom
when suddenly
on the way down
the slide
turns into someone’s insides
and you’re running your fingers
along the walls of her womb
Listen to the audio recording here:
This poem appears in Pas De Deux, Indrani Perera’s second collection of poetry.
A big thank you to Michelle McCowage whose brilliant poem inspired this poem.
On the weekend I flew to Adelaide to celebrate 10 years of Ginninderra Press in Port Adelaide. The press has grown from humble beginnings in a spare bedroom in Canberra into a successful publishing house.
Wild, an anthology of poetry was created to celebrate the milestone and it was launched on Saturday afternoon. The diverse collection of poems features works by 159 poets from all around Australia. Many were already Ginninderra Press authors and some had never written poetry before. As well as the launch of Wild, there were also two fascinating panel discussions, What Good is Poetry? and Telling the Truth: How Are Fiction and Non-Fiction Alike and How Do They Differ? If all the writing goodness wasn't enough, there were also drinks, lunch and afternoon tea served.
Ginninderra Press is an independent Australian publisher. We all have a story to be told and beautiful words locked within us, waiting to be heard. GP publishes authors too small to be taken on by the major publishing houses. They publish fiction, non-fiction, short stories, poetry and chap books.
In its 22 year history Ginninderra Press has published well over 950 Australian authors and sold in excess of 180,000 books. At the helm is publisher and owner Stephen Matthews. Or Mr GP as Brenda Eldridge his partner, muse and editor of the chapbook series calls him.
I had the good fortune to meet Stephen in 1996 when we were both living in Canberra. Stephen had just started Ginninderra Press and was teaching an evening class called Getting Published which I attended. I had always been a writer and my dream was to be a published author. Little did I know doing Stephen's course was going to be life changing.
At the end of the course, Stephen gave all of his students an opportunity to share their work with him and have it assessed for suitability for publication. Not everyone gave him their work but I gave him some of my poems. Of course I did! Getting someone in the industry to assess my work? Priceless. As I learnt in the course, the publishing industry is notoriously difficult to get into and you never get feedback about your work from publishers unless they want to publish it.
And Stephen's response to my work? He wanted to publish. my. poems. In. a. book. My poems in an honest to God, hold in your hands and turn the pages book! It was a dream come true.
During the closing speech at the celebrations on Saturday afternoon, Stephen presented me with a thermal bound copy of my book of poetry published all those years ago. The original edition had a laminated cover and was stapled together. It's long been out of print. I have no words to describe my feelings of joy and gratitude. It was an incredible surprise and I got all teary at his kindness and generosity. Especially as we hadn't been in contact for almost twenty years. And then he told me the book was now back in print and available through Ginninderra Press, Book Depository and Amazon. Oh my.
I was humbled at dinner on Saturday night when Stephen told me I had a gift for writing poetry that was incredibly rare in someone as young as I was when he first published me. He said I had an accessible way of expressing my emotions without become filled with excruciating angst. I'm paraphrasing here. I was too awed at the time to remember the exact words.
I am lucky to be part of the GP family. I feel so grateful to Stephen for taking a chance on the young poet I was and publishing Defenestration, my collection of poetry. I am forever in his debt.
If you're interested in reading what Stephen saw in me all those years ago, you can buy the book over at Ginninderra Press. And if you've got a manuscript lurking in the bottom drawer, send it in to GP. You never know where it may lead!
On the weekend I flew to Adelaide to celebrate 10 years of Ginninderra Press in Port Adelaide. The press has grown from humble beginnings in a spare bedroom in Canberra into a successful publishing house.
Wild, an anthology of poetry was created to celebrate the milestone and it was launched on Saturday afternoon. The diverse collection of poems features works by 159 poets from all around Australia. Many were already Ginninderra Press authors and some had never written poetry before. As well as the launch of Wild, there were also two fascinating panel discussions, What Good is Poetry? and Telling the Truth: How Are Fiction and Non-Fiction Alike and How Do They Differ? If all the writing goodness wasn't enough, there were also drinks, lunch and afternoon tea served.
Ginninderra Press is an independent Australian publisher. We all have a story to be told and beautiful words locked within us, waiting to be heard. GP publishes authors too small to be taken on by the major publishing houses. They publish fiction, non-fiction, short stories, poetry and chap books.
In its 22 year history Ginninderra Press has published well over 950 Australian authors and sold in excess of 180,000 books. At the helm is publisher and owner Stephen Matthews. Or Mr GP as Brenda Eldridge his partner, muse and editor of the chapbook series calls him.
I had the good fortune to meet Stephen in 1996 when we were both living in Canberra. Stephen had just started Ginninderra Press and was teaching an evening class called Getting Published which I attended. I had always been a writer and my dream was to be a published author. Little did I know doing Stephen's course was going to be life changing.
At the end of the course, Stephen gave all of his students an opportunity to share their work with him and have it assessed for suitability for publication. Not everyone gave him their work but I gave him some of my poems. Of course I did! Getting someone in the industry to assess my work? Priceless. As I learnt in the course, the publishing industry is notoriously difficult to get into and you never get feedback about your work from publishers unless they want to publish it.
And Stephen's response to my work? He wanted to publish. my. poems. In. a. book. My poems in an honest to God, hold in your hands and turn the pages book! It was a dream come true.
During the closing speech at the celebrations on Saturday afternoon, Stephen presented me with a thermal bound copy of my book of poetry published all those years ago. The original edition had a laminated cover and was stapled together. It's long been out of print. I have no words to describe my feelings of joy and gratitude. It was an incredible surprise and I got all teary at his kindness and generosity. Especially as we hadn't been in contact for almost twenty years. And then he told me the book was now back in print and available through Ginninderra Press, Book Depository and Amazon. Oh my.
I was humbled at dinner on Saturday night when Stephen told me I had a gift for writing poetry that was incredibly rare in someone as young as I was when he first published me. He said I had an accessible way of expressing my emotions without become filled with excruciating angst. I'm paraphrasing here. I was too awed at the time to remember the exact words.
I am lucky to be part of the GP family. I feel so grateful to Stephen for taking a chance on the young poet I was and publishing Defenestration, my collection of poetry. I am forever in his debt.
If you're interested in reading what Stephen saw in me all those years ago, you can buy the book over at Ginninderra Press. And if you've got a manuscript lurking in the bottom drawer, send it in to GP. You never know where it may lead!