Poem in Snorkel

A few weeks ago I had the great pleasure of being published in an online poetry journal called Snorkel.  Snorkel is a great journal, publishing Australian and New Zealand poetry and from around the world.  My poem is one of my oneiric poems, meaning dream-like.  The poem resonates with Holderlin's poetry, and has a line structure that is similar to Holderlin's.  The poem aims to find that fragmented and disjointed beauty we find in dreams.  You can read the poem here in the Snorkel journal. Hope you enjoy!

Award for Brainwaves

Last Saturday night our radio show Brain Waves won an award at the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia awards dinner. The award was for excellence in training.  When we were trained, we all did demos, and 3CR sent them in. The award is very large, and a national award, and everyone at Brain Waves is over the moon.  I got to go up on stage with my colleagues and the collect the award. I was wearing my top hat of course! Ben Rinaudo, our program co-ordinator, gave a great speech. Hopefully this award helps to lay another plank on the bridge towards the de-stigmatisation of mental illness in the community. Thanks to the Mental Illness Fellowship of Victoria who sponsor the show.

Feature at the Dan O'Connell

On Saturday I had the great pleasure of being the feature poet at the Dan O'Connell poetry sessions.  I had an half an hour slot, and so got to show case a good portion of my oeuvre.  I read from from published poems, my new poems, and some old favourites.  I also read from my two books, which was a real treat.  I sold some of my books, and signed a few copies.  There were about 20 people there, and I got quite an ovation at the end of my time. I even got to where my top hat! The Dan O'Connell is a real institution, and it was an honour to be able to contribute to this great history.

Griffith University Conference

Had the great pleasure last week to be invited to the anual Griffith University postgraduate conference, called Borders Boundaries and Transgressions. It was at the Gold Coast campus.  The day was filled with great postgraduate papers, on a whole range of topics, from acquired brain injury, to artist rights, to social media and gothic fiction. My part of the day came at the end when I was asked to speak to the postgraduates about careers post the PhD.  I spoke about my life as a writer, the media I had done, my experiences volunteering for mental health NGO's and gave some advice about the PhD experience itself.  A great day was had by all, and looking forward to next year!