Sunday, August 23, 2026

In Memory

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are informed that the following text contains the name of a person who has passed away.

It's almost a year since Charmaine passed, and I want to mark this with a poem that was written at the same time as the sequence I posted for 'CPG' in October last year, after Tracy and I had gone on to Charmaine's birth Country and paid our respects to her spirit and to those of her ancestors. We send Charmaine's family and her people our best and wish to honour her memory, always.


Fringed Lily at Eradu

 

Defies the drift

of clearance

 

and establishes

a zone of intense

 

expression, fringes

vibrating with vocalisations

 

of story and curiosity,

of insect visitation.

 

Afterimages burn

deep to remind us

 

when seasons are forced

to work with the blanked

 

sandplain, to reach

far back into seedbanks,

 

to remember

the flourishing.

 

 

            John Kinsella

 

 

 

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