Otway Journal - Coming Back to Earth

‘Stoney Rises Landscape’ - Artist Salvina Conti Image Segment

2021

2 Forward

This is our 20th publication and it is different to anything we have done before.

Rather than wind up Otway Life Magazine/Almanac in response to the economic hard times – we didn’t want to hassle already stressed people for advertising funds – we thought we would do an online version under the new title: Otway Journal – coming back to earth.

While much of the content is sourced from the greater Otways region, in this journal we also include voices and visions from further afield.

Otway Journal – coming back to earth, is an offering to you, from both Gill and I, in gratitude for all the support we have received with our publications over the past seven years.

In this journal we have been inspired by eco-philosopher, Joanna Macy, who celebrates a lifetime of work along with her 90th birthday this year. Her vision, The Work that Reconnects, is well summed up in this quote: ‘In the face of overwhelming social and ecological crises, this work helps people transform despair and apathy into constructive, collaborative action. It brings a new way of seeing the world as our larger living body.

Gill & Nettie

Taking the lead from the ‘Active Hope Spiral’, this Otway Journal is divided into four sections: Gratitude, State of Mind, Perspectives & Going Forth. Each section is filled with articles, poetry and art that we trust you will find thought-provoking and hope-inspiring.

Cover art by Salvina Conti. Full image on last page

Image source: https://www.joannamacy.net/main

We hope you find some nourishment and inspiration from this Journal and go well into the future.

Otway Journal – coming back to earth is a free, online publication produced without profit for the purpose of education, entertainment and enjoyment.

Contents 3

Contents Gratitude 4

Perspectives 64

Trina Ebling 6 Escape to Otway Fields 10 Rex 14 A Little Blue Bird of Gratitude - Sign From the Universe 15 Portal Postcard Project 16 How I came to be not-yet-an-artist 18 Debra Chant 22 Colac Otway Arts Trail 2020-2021 24 What is Work That Reconnects?

25 Beauty in Truth The Botanical Art of Margaret Stone 26 Cinnamon Stephens 29 Studio Forrest 31

Eco 66 Seeing with new eyes 67 Portraits of a Pandemic 69 She Just Is 71 Another word for ‘politically correct’ 72 Book Review 74 Grassroots to Selfies-Paradise 75 The Community that Connects Together Survives Together 78 Declan Armstrong 80 Erin Downie 83 Meet A Local: John Bartlett, Poet/Gardener 84 Phil Weymouth 87 Irma 89 In the Ground of Our Unknowing 90 Spectres 96 What She Does Not Know Three Stories of Our Time 97 Death Came Dancing In On A Stick…

98 Water & Light: A Strange Masquerade 100

State of Mind

32

The age of Solastalgia 34 Cry Your Tears 37 Disgust: what is not discussed in Australian politics 38 Looking out over the fjord I count the years 44 James Eric Watkins 45 Summer On The Painkalac 46 Bereft 51 In between places 52 Meet Simon Rigg - Artist and Nature Lover 55 Linear Artists: Vicki West 58 Kooparoona Niara - Mountains of the Spirits 60 Hold Your Own 63

Going Forth

102

Silvereye 105 for the Mad Farmer - Thinking Peacefully 106 In Silence 107 Renee Karacsay - Wild Women 108 Five Ways to Create Self-Care During Self-Isolation 110 Time to heal: Uluru healing the people and the land 114 What Happens Next?

118 Weeyn Yakeen - Fire Dreaming 119 Shaping a Brave New World 120 Entering the Bardo 122 The Wolves of Lenteme 124 44th Apollo Bay Art Show 126 Books to Challenge, Inspire, Nourish and Soothe 128 Tjanimaku Tjukurpa: how one young man came good 134 Active Hope 135

Afterword A Vision

136

Gratitude 4

is a warm feeling of thankfulness towards the world, or towards specific individuals.

The person who feels gratitude is thankful for what they have, and does not constantly seek more.

Living with gratitude can be a subversive act in our modern day society because the grateful person is not driven by cravings to have more, more, and yet more...

“Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously.

And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.”

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

“In times of turmoil and danger, gratitude helps to steady and ground us. It brings us into presence, and our full presence is perhaps the best offering we can make to our world.”

- Joanna Macey

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Trina Ebling ‘I seek to examine and question how we exist in relation to ourselves, others and the environment. The impact and connections that these social and natural interactions have is central to my work.’

My art reflects and draws inspiration from the natural environment: I am inspired by landscapes I’ve seen, journeys I’ve experienced and people I’ve met. I seek to capture the patterns and layers underlying Nature’s resilience yet fragility, her repetitive cycles of growth and decay.

As a child I lived along Kangaroo Ground Road beside Dingley Dell (what’s not to like about those names!) There I was immersed in Warrandyte’s artistic environment during the 1950s and 1960s, and therefore developed an early interest in all art forms - sculpture, painting, pottery and print-making. Yellow-box eucalypts, ti-tree understorey, and carpets of thick soft mosses and scatterings of wildflowers filled my eight acres of bushland home. I soon developed an early curiosity to explore gravel tracks leading over hilly horizons, mine shafts along quartz reefs and creeks meandering towards the Yarra River. The outdoors challenged my sense of adventure! Neighbours’ houses were built largely from natural materials and the hilly terrain necessitated terracing in timber or river rock Edna Walling style. And in every third household lived a practising artist.

The 1962 bushfire threatened loss of everything. Our house survived but the losses of others was poignant and tragic; our landscape now starkly described by a blackened criss-crossing of well-worn animal tracks and pathways. The landscape, burnt bare, all our familiar landmarks erased as we struggled to find our bearings.

We recovered and, as weeks and months drifted by, so did the landscape which continued to surprise us with its outbursts of fresh olive-green growth sprouting from thickly blackened eucalypt trunks. The wildflowers, particularly blue pincushions, flowered in abundance and in new areas where they previously had not grown.

Nearby Potters’ Cottage, where I was employed as a teenager, influenced my early interest in sculpture and in 3-D art using natural materials. Their heavy rustic tableware were part of every kitchen in Warrandyte until

Kate Janeba’s smooth simplified pottery outlines and deep viridian glazes (learned in Japan on her way to Australia from war-torn Austria) started to influence more classic styles. My kitchen still has a cup and saucer by Kate Janeba, looking quite contemporary alongside the finelycrafted modern mudware. An early but lasting influence.

Following a career teaching in Professional Writing & Editing (the Gordon) and the School of Communication and Literary Studies (Deakin University), on retirement I returned to my love of art. At this stage I was fortunate enough to be able to study Visual Art & Contemporary Craft locally through South West TAFE at Forrest Neighbourhood House with an inspiring teacher Salvina Conti and a wonderful group of contemporary artists.

We continue to share our art practice at StudioForrest, normally travelling weekly from Apollo Bay, Skenes Creek, Barwon Downs, Barongarook, Kawarren and Warrion.

This friendship and support of other artists is an important part of my art practice, as is our studio location in beautiful Forrest. The greens and blue tonal dry sclerophyll and rainforest landscape contrasts with my location in the western district grasslands of scoria reds and rich chocolate loams or scorched grass tussocks. During covid-19 StudioForrest has encouraged each other’s ‘art practice in iso’ by creating postcards and mailing them snail mail for another artist to complete, and we’ve shared ideas and artwork through weekly zoom activities.

Thankyou Gillian Brew and FNH for organising this!!!

As an artist I have been inspired and influenced by the macrocosm/microcosm landscapes and frottage of John Wolseley; the landscape in motion captured by Vincent Van Gogh; and Australian sculptors Bronwyn Oliver and Inge King. As a result of these influences, I like to explore diverse media on various surfaces; from oils, gouache and acrylic paint to prints, carved stone and local volcanic rock. Some pieces are full of colour and strength, but I also enjoy tracing the most delicate of lines and seeing where that leads me.

Gratitude 7

Transition mixed media. 2010

I didn’t realise at the time how prophetic this artwork was. The winged artist stripped bare and alone, exploring the forest of tangled vines, branches, roots and trunks. The inner dark murkiness is lightened by the softness and texture of the dried hellebores and hydrangea and by the highlights of gold and copper light within. I’ve used conte, charcoal, oil pastels and graphite

Inuit Mother, kiln-fired ceramic. 2012

Inuit Mother has become my gatekeeper at home near the back door.

Her direct gaze and the tilt of her head expresses freedom, self-belief and strength. This bust is smooth-skinned and muscular to reflect life within a harsh climate. The leather thong tying her plaited hair and natural tones reflect the strong link between Inuit culture and nature. Her traditional markings define her as someone who has endured.

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FNQ geocache acrylic on canvas 2009 My son gave me a blank canvas as a birthday gift when I first enrolled in Salvina’s class. It took me quite a while to actually conceptualise such a large blank space! I visualised the journey travelled earlier in the year to Far North Queensland, with its lush tropical rainforest and butterflies as well as the massive carved marble blocks further inland. I then employed a Fibonacci sequence to divide the canvas as a record of the landscape as we geocached along the way.

Pied Oyster Catcher Egg

Water depths

copper etching 2014

encaustic with bark, string and paper 2019

This wading bird is found along the nearby coastline but they seldom eat oysters! They nest in shallow scrapes in open areas near the shore. I enjoyed etching a quick sketch on copper. It allowed me free movement yet line and shade detail.

The layering process of encaustic work adds depth and interest in an artwork. This was largely an experiment to explore how the encaustic process and effects. I like the hidden depths achieved here.

Gratitude 9

Guitar Dreaming solvent image transfer on Indian ragpaper 2012 The roughened texture of homemade paper contrasts with the softened image of the guitar player.

What Lies Beneath gesso, graphite and eco-dyed paper 2018 The layers of landscape were created by a moving and enlarging a photocopy of an earlier gesso-textured landscape artwork. Using detailed graphite tracings of root-lines and crevices I was then able to explore the sedimentary layers of earth to create patternings.

Superimposed on the landscape are the natural eco-dyed tones of a ‘boiled book’ activity. (no books were harmed during this activity)

Bicycle ride through the Netherlands drypoint etched print 2012 A day of bike riding along pathways and canals, guided by the prominent church spires rising out of the flat landscape in each town.

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Escape to Otway Fields

by Ami Hillege

Vegetable garden with a view across the Otways

There’s nothing like a pandemic to create a new focus on becoming just a little more self-sufficient. Most seasons I amble through the tasks of planting, harvesting and cleaning up garden beds, before starting the process all over again. I’ve always loved placing food on the table that I’ve grown, but I’ve been rather casual about it. Now I realise that I have a responsibility to myself, my family and my garden to nurture this patch of dirt and be more proactive in growing our own produce.

Sure, there’s going to be excess produce. And isn’t that a wonderful problem to have?! Frans and I have always followed this mantra: “Grow it yourself. Barter and share with neighbours and family. Buy local. Keep your food miles low.

Eat seasonally. And look after the bees!” Besides being able to

enjoy our own produce and share the excess, the simple act of growing our own food gives me great satisfaction.

There’s so much more to vegetable gardening than sticking a few seeds into some dirt. Each season comes with the excitement of planning the planting of the next season’s bounty. I love to pour over seed catalogues, sort my seed packets, make lists and glean as much information and inspiration I can find before getting started.

My planning and pondering at the beginning of autumn made me consider our current garden layout. To achieve maximum results for the effort I’m willing to commit to growing food, I realised I needed to change the structure of one garden area. I coerced some strong fellas, (husband, son in law and a mate), to rejig the area that held three very long, ugly, raised beds, and soon I was doodling on graph paper and plotting out the planting schedule for a new potager kitchen garden. Gone were the metal sheets, and in place were a dozen neat garden beds, one width of timber high. I have found that I have much more success with vegetables when they’re grown close to the ground.

The previous metal raised beds tended to dry out quickly, so I was keen to try a new approach.

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Men at work. Constructing the new potager garden I’m the sort of gardener who likes straight lines, yet I know that a random vegetable patch is just as productive and probably more resistant to the critters who love to feast on everything that has been planted for food. So, I’ve decided to plant my two separate kitchen gardens in two completely different styles. My original garden is covered by a large netted area (it needs to be redone shortly, and that’s another big job on the never ending list!) and this will be the untamed, ‘plant it where there’s a space’ food garden. Here I will allow fennel to go to seed, providing the bees and pollinators a feast of pollen, lettuces will be allowed to self-seed and kale will be encouraged to flower. I’m not too fussy about keeping roots in their own bed, or having a dedicated leaf bed.

Instead, I’ll use more of a permaculture approach, practice companion planting and allow plants to follow their full growth cycle. This will allow me to save and share seeds from this prolific kitchen garden.

The new potager garden is far more formal and I love it. (those straight lines!) Twelve neat beds are planted with crop rotation in mind. The pathways are wide enough to move between the beds freely with a wheelbarrow or garden trolley, and a central aisle is wide enough to get the tractor in to dump compost or mulch, saving a lot of wheelbarrow work.

Garden beds settling into the business of growing The rule of thumb I like to use with planting is as follows: First legumes; beans and peas, followed by roots. These are obviously carrots, beets, turnips, onions and garlic. After roots, I will plant fruit. Think about tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, peppers and eggplants. Finally, after the fruit bed is done fruiting, the leaves get their turn. Now the herbs, spinach, lettuce, brassicas and other leafy greens get planted in that tomato bed. The beauty of having twelve beds, is that I can dedicate four beds to each vegetable category. I don’t have to wait till the end of summer to plant greens in the tomatoes bed. I can start them all at once and follow the rotation pattern.

I’m writing this piece as we enter the last month of Spring.

We’ve been feasting on produce from the garden for months now. Dinner is determined by what gets picked each day. The delight of picking our first telephone peas, broad beans and artichokes is a treat we look forward to each year. Our favourite spring recipe is one inspired by the book “Honey from a weed” by Patience Gray.

This book is wonderful. It’s part memoir, part recipes. No fancy pictures, and the recipes are mostly suggestions. It’s a book you can dip in and out of and pick up little growing and cooking tips here and there. If you love collecting good recipe books, then this is one you’ll use and love.

CARCIOFI CON RISO - Artichokes with rice Peel back the outer leaves of 6 artichokes, leave an inch or so of the stem, quarter them and remove the choke (the fuzzy bit inside).

Fry in olive oil in a shallow pan with 2 peeled cloves of garlic.

When slightly brown, add a cupful of arborio rice, cook for 3 minutes, stirring. Then add 3 cups of hot chicken stock, a little at a time. You’re basically making a risotto.

Add a dozen or so rinsed capers. I love to add freshly podded broad beans and peas too if they’re ready. Cook till the liquid is absorbed.

Add chopped parsley or coriander. Turn out into an earthenware dish and cover with several layers of cloth. Wait 10 minutes and enjoy with hard boiled eggs for a lovely spring dish.

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Broad beans emerging in the wooden frame

Garden beds settling into the business of growing

One of the best pieces of advice I’ve implemented this past season is to build a structure to contain the broad beans. I’ve been so impressed at the success of this simple but effective frame. I’ve not lost any plants to the strong damaging winds that we have experienced over the past few weeks. This tip was one I learned from Mickey Robinson at Glenmore House. Mickey has a very informative podcast that takes you through an entire year of planting and growing.

For the first time this season, I’ve also managed to grow some magnificent cabbages and a swathe of broccoli and cauliflower. There is no reason why they should be so good this year other than this one thing. When I planted the seedlings way back in April, I put a wire frame over the seedlings, high enough to give them some room to grow. Then I covered the frame with mosquito netting.

The seedlings grew beautifully, and no cabbage moth came near them. Once the plants hit the top of the frame, I removed the protection and by then the moths had all disappeared. Maybe I got lucky, but this is one practice I will use again. There’s one consideration I need to make next season, and that is to think ‘less is more’. Brassicas take up an awful lot of real estate in a vegetable bed, and they can get overcrowded if planted too close together.

A punnet of six cabbages is going to keep us well fed for months! We’re looking forward to stuffed cabbage rolls,

Monster cabbages braised cabbage with bacon, and of course a good batch of sauerkraut.

As summer advances, I’m anticipating the arrival of the first ripe tomatoes, the berries and the stone fruit.

Preserving our harvest as we cross over the seasons will more important as we adjust to our new Covid-normal.

One thing 2020 had taught us is to make the most of what we have and to appreciate it.

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These are a few of my favourite things: 1. Audible books. Borrow Box is an app that allows you to download books from your library. You will never catch me in the garden without someone reading to me.

2. My Spotify playlist. Ami’s Music. A little bit laid back, not too noisy!

3. My Pantry by Alice Waters. Alice is my food hero!

Keep it simple. Keep it fresh. This recipe book is a guide to making and curating pantry staples.

4. Any recipe book by Yotham Ottolenghi. Simple is one I love especially. I want to make everything in it! (I have them all except the latest, Flavour. Santa are you reading this?)

5. Lambley gardens and nursery located at Ascot, Victoria. A visual treat.

6. Great Dixter for pure garden inspiration.

International travel may not be on the cards for a while, but we can still virtually enjoy a stunning country garden.

7. Our Permaculture Life by Morag Gamble. There is so much to learn from this amazing permaculture educator. Watch her YouTube videos for ideas of growing and eating your harvest. She got me eating sorrel!

8. Green Harvest for seeds. I’ve been using them for years and their strike rate is good.

9. Ravelry for thousands of yarn projects! My current favourite knit designers are Stephen West, Kate Davies and Marie Wallen. As much as I love my garden, I can’t wait to pick up my knitting needles each evening.

10. Tarndie for locally grown yarn. What can be better than knowing where your wool was grown?! Check out the new wool shop.

11. Yellowstone on Stan. What can I say? Kevin Costner is still a hunk!

Follow Ami on Website: https://www.otwayfields.com

Net covering the newly planted brassicas

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Rex It was a Spotted Pardalote (Pardalotus punctatus) – I didn’t know that then, but I do now. A tiny fellow of barely ten centimetres long, grey-brown upper-parts, a black crown, yellow breeches, a red tail and lovely white spots. Seeing this most handsome tiny be-spotted fellow, at arms length, is enough to make any day special - but this day was to be so much more.

I’d been looking for a bush property since forever.

Somewhere to tap into my inner Thoreau, commune with nature, preferably close to the coast, and as Anna Karenina desired – ‘blow the dust from my soul’. I loved the city life of Melbourne with its great art, music, food and culture but I needed the stillness of the bush and somewhere to escape. I dreamed of having somewhere where I could unspool and let the surrounding nature seep into me, somewhere not too far from a nice longboard friendly wave, somewhere that my wife could engage in her hobbies and share my nature immersion, and where my two teenage daughters could relax, find quiet time and have space to do their own thing.

It was April 2013 and today was the day of final inspection of 25 acres of rare acaridan beauty in the Pennyroyal valley. The day I was to sign on the dotted line and handed over the deposit. As I drove down the driveway, I felt a sense of nervous wonderment and an overwhelming responsibility, to both my family and myself. There was a clearing of two acres or so with a small orchard, a bright northerly aspect, all cradled to the southerly points by dry forest with mature trees and falling away to the north into a treed gully. As I parked the car and looked around, a spritely old gent ambled over to me and introduced himself as ‘Rex’ – the owner.

Rex was barely five and half feet tall, with a firm and wiry build and the slow deliberate stride of a country gentleman. He had a thick cloud of grey hair with a matching beard, dark eyes and a possum-like gentle face.

A flannelette shirt, tucked in to jeans, with a trusty old belt and well-worn boots. Rex was a picture of rude rural health, fit as the proverbial fiddle. It seemed quite possible that he came from this land. He had seen 82 summers on this earth and it was as if you could plant him, stand him in some compost and horse manure and he’d see another 82

summers. He had been clearing a few trees and chopping some firewood. He was, it seems, how I imagined an older version of myself.

For several hours he spoke and I listened carefully, in a dreamlike state. He had planned to build and live here after establishing the Berry Farm next door back in 1980.

But life and time just ran away from him and it was now sadly too late. He told me all about the history of the property; the making of the old wood shed that was cut and milled onsite, how and when to control various invasive weed species, the structure of the dams, the enormous variety of flora and fauna, the seasonal creeks in the gullies.

He took me through the orchard, “The Mariposa plums have been prolific and delicious. And the Beurre Bosc Pears are sweet and juicy but no luck with the apples this year” he said. He explained the conservation covenant that he arranged to be placed on the land by Trust for Nature and the ensuing audit performed by their Ecologists which yielded a delightfully varied list of wonder - the Sugar Gliders, the Echidnas, the stand of rare Brooker Gums (E.Brookiana) in the south east corner (generally only found in Tasmania) and the jewel in the crown - the 25 acres of old growth Messmate (E.Obliqua).

He had a white binder in his tree root like hands - full of contacts for local tradesmen, hardware stores, local Landcare newsletters, contact details for the guy who owned the bee hives by the front dam - all carefully filed along other bits and pieces of useful information; “Call Simon if you need any fencing done” he said.

As we stood there admiring the property, we both agreed that the land needed more of a custodian than an owner.

I shook Rex’s hand and thanked him. I was about to set off to see the Real Estate agent. “You will always be welcome here Rex”, I said and with a tear in his eye, Rex gave me his blessing to become that custodian.

As we spoke, a little bird, a Spotted Pardalote, flitted down from a nearby Messmate branch a little above head height and seemed to be feeding on the ground at our feet. We were both quiet – just watching – admiring the beauty of it all.

Maurice Clark A bird watching, book reading, guitar playing, motorcycling, bush walking, surfing nature lover - who bounces between Brunswick and his 25 acre hideaway in the Otways on a very regular basis

Gratitude 15

A Little Blue Bird of Gratitude Sign From the Universe

by Lauren Crute Blue Wren - Nathan Patterson

Last Sunday I drove to Buckley Falls and asked the universe for a sign. A sign that it was listening.

I stood at the lookout and started meditating. I asked the universe a question, cleared my mind as much as I could, relaxed and allowed myself to be open to receive…

A short while later I thought, ‘how will I know if the universe answers me? What sign should I look for?’ (Or more accurately, what would I manifest?) As instantly as I’d thought the question, bluebird came to mind - a bird with blue feathers, not an actual bluebird. A minute or two later I opened my eyes and laughed at myself as I was scanning the cliff and the sky- as if I would see anything that instantly!

It was a short but beautiful meditation. I felt centred and happy and had no expectation that I would see any blue bird. I was just grateful to be feeling peaceful.

I turned back towards my car, but something was pulling me towards the bush path nearby. My intuition was telling me it wasn’t time to go yet.

I came to a clearing by the river among the gum trees.

It was so peaceful. No-one else was there. Just me and nature. I reminded myself that there was no rush. I was allowed to be here having my own time and space. I sat down facing the river and looked ahead. And there, 10 meters directly in front of me on a tree branch over the water… was a blue bird! A ‘splendid fairy wren’! It sat there flitting around for a moment or two before flying off to the next tree and out of sight.

This was an almost indescribable moment for me! It was like I gained such clarity and yet it felt surreal at the same time. I felt an intense and beautiful connection with everything around me. I was filled with joy, love, peace… it was as though invisible arms wrapped around me in a warm embrace.

The universe definitely let me know it is listening. But more than that, it made me feel so loved, and reassured that I am never alone.

Much love and gratitude, #intuition #theuniverselovesyou #grateful #thoughtsbecomethings#happy

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Portal Postcard Project Interview with Harriet Gaffney - Surf Coast Shire Arts Officer What was the inspiration behind launching the Portal Postcard Project in the Surf Coast?

When it became evident that Victoria would be in Lockdown for some time Surf Coast Shire Council knew that the Arts would be vital in helping to ensure well-being.

As Arts Officer, I saw that we needed to support not only individual practitioners whose incomes would be severely impacted, but also the well-being of the wider community.

Whilst there were a plethora of fabulous offerings online from arts practitioners and organisations across the world, our own artists were about to lose the most significant arts event run by the Shire – The Surf Coast Arts Trail, and few of them had the skills to pivot their own work online without support. That’s how #Portal was born. #Portal Postcards grew out of early recognition that our community needed to be able to do more for their wellbeing than screen-related activities during lockdown. We wanted to create a COVID-responsive arts program that would support individual artists and the community connect.

We soon discovered that one of our Arts Trail artists, Deirdre Boeyen-Carmichael, was painting these spectacular postcard-size paintings and gifting them to isolated members of the community and we loved the idea.

A few mornings each week activist and artist Deirdre would paint the sunrise from the same location and record information on the back including time, wind direction and tide. Each postcard was a time capsule, created during a time that was new and uncertain, and for some people very lonely. Deirdre wanted to give people hope and joy and connect them to the glorious natural world we are so lucky to call home, and we loved this. With her permission we decided to take the project Shire-wide.

How did you engage the postcard artists?

We contacted our registered artists directly and shared the story of Deirdre’s individual postcard project. Artists were given five blank postcards with the knowledge that three of their works would go to vulnerable/isolated members of the community and two would return to them from other participating artists. Through social and print media and the PORTAL website the general public were also encouraged to get involved.

On December 16th 2020, PORTAL will launch an online exhibition of selected works on the website www. surfcoastartstrail.com.au

How did you link up with the recipients?

The Surf Coast Shire distributed the postcards to artists and used their Positive Ageing Client mailing list to send out approximately 150 postcards.

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What has been the response and feedback?

We have had fantastic feedback from artists who participated. Some attached a little note of thanks and others with a message of how the project has helped them focus on something positive during lockdown and social distancing. The project has not only benefited the recipients of the postcards but also the artist’s themselves.

The joy of giving and joy of creating has been such a positive thing in such a negative time and provided a sense of purpose and connection for artists and recipients.

Is this a project that is time limited or could continue indefinitely?

With the upcoming exhibition, this particular project has an end date but the hope is that more artists and the public will take inspiration like we did from Deirdre and send mini-artworks to people they think may need a

pick-me-up. The fall-out from COVID on people’s mental health can’t be underestimated so if people can brighten someone’s day by sending them a beautiful postcard they lovingly made, we encourage that 100%. We can’t put an end date to that.

6. What have you learned from this project?

The generosity and compassion to take the time to create a postcard, an original artwork, not once but five times is not lost on me. We had about 50 artists send us their work and the detail and effort that went in to these 250 postcards was amazing. It’s opened my eyes to the vast talent we have right here on our door-step in The Surf Coast Shire.

Finally a BIG shout out of thanks to our lovely local area coordinator Michelle Conn for all of her hard work seeing this beautiful little project through to completion.

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How I came to be not-yet-an-artist

by Joy Hecht I don’t call myself an artist. Not yet. I’ve dabbled throughout my life – graphic design, watercolor, sewing, mosaics - but I’ve been an economist for the past thirty years, not an artist! So how did I land up exploring a new career at age 64, creating collages of places I’ve been or places I’d like to be, and wondering whether at my age I could possibly go to art school?

When I was young, I was fascinated by graphic design.

I invented typefaces in the margins of my class notes, and designed posters for the choral group I sang with in college. But I let my mother talk me out of a scheme to ditch my grad school plans to study art in Paris. That was a good choice, on the whole – I spent a very interesting thirty years traveling around the world working on environmental policy and economics in the developing world, and was delighted to travel through Africa, Asia, and the Middle East.

Somewhere along the line, I took up watercolors. I came across the urban sketchers, people who sketch on site and share their work with each other on the internet. There are urban sketchers all over the world; I joined them in Jakarta, Paris, Beirut, and London. It was a lot of fun, though my work wasn’t much good.

Then a few years ago, I followed an impulse to depict the city where I happened to be at the time in collage instead of watercolor. To my surprise, I liked the result much better. In watercolor I never knew when to stop, I didn’t manage colors well, and everything came out muddy and overworked. In collage, somehow I understood how to define shapes and structures, and the white space took form as easily as the objects within it.

So I kept at it. I quickly built up a supply of materials to work with – newspapers, advertising flyers, manila envelopes pinched from my office, junk mail, take-out menus. When people brought chocolates to share at work (traveling consultants have a great tradition of bringing chocolates from the duty free!) I scavenged the bright shiny wrappers. When flying, I searched the freebie airline magazines for good colors, and tore out the pages that interested me. Where local languages used unfamiliar

alphabets, I collected pages of text that offered useful patterns without being readable, at least to people from western countries. In time, I found that I wasn’t gathering enough of key colors – muted greens for landscape, dark reds for brick, wispy grays for clouds, blue-greens for the sea – and I took to putting paint or ink or pastel on newsprint or printer paper, to get the shades I really wanted.

Most of my collages are of cities, which have always fascinated me. After first trying this out in Beirut, I went on to depict New York (where I grew up), St. John’s Newfoundland (where I live now), streets in Paris, markets in London and Harare, canals in Amsterdam, and on occasion even the countryside. After a few years, having accumulated a fair number of collages, I began to think about selling them. So my work is now in two galleries in Newfoundland, has been in a few local shows, and I sell both prints and originals – not only to my friends, either. ;-))) Most exciting to me was that my collages were chosen

by Link NYC to be shown on electronic kiosks all over New York City, and for two weeks my vision of my home town could be seen by millions of people!

Recent events have changed my patterns. When the COVID lockdowns struck, I couldn’t do collages on site, and accepted that I’d have to work from photos. In some ways that’s actually been great. The urban sketchers groups who used to meet on site took to zoom and sketched from google street view. That meant we could all get together with sketchers anywhere in the world, without getting on a plane first. So I’ve been meeting regularly with the Lebanese and the Chileans, and have made collages of towns in Chile that I’d never even heard of before.

These days I also don’t have much consulting work, so I figured that it must be time for a new career. Which is how, at almost 65, I’ve decided that for my next act, I’m going to be an artist. I don’t want a hobby in my retirement, either; I want a career that I enjoy and other people value. For that, I have to get up every morning to and go to work creating art - and creating a new enterprise that gets my art to the people who want it. I have lots and lots to learn, both about art and about the business of art, but it’s certainly interesting!

Soon I might even start calling myself an artist.

About the author: Joy Hecht is an artist and environmental economist living in St. John’s, Newfoundland - but hoping to return to her home town of New York next year, pandemic permitting. You can see more of her work at http://joyhecht-arts.com/.

Gratitude 19

Rue des Trois Portes (2019) – I had planned to make a collage of Nôtre Dame post-blaze, but this small street nearby, the Rue des Trois Portes, caught my attention instead. I have no idea what three doors the street name refers to, though.

20

Beirut Corniche (2017) – Beirut is a wild and crazy city – but also a beautiful place with spectacular views of the Mediterranean coast. The white structure farthest to the left in this collage is the grain elevator that was spectacularly destroyed in the explosion that rocked the city in the summer of 2020.

Coastlne - Red Ochre

Gratitude 21

Ile de la Cité (2019) – Iconic view of Paris – what else is there to say?

View from Ed’s (2019) – View of Brooklyn and the F train from a friend’s window. He’s done me untold favors, so this collage now hangs on his wall – he can compare it with the real thing any time!

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Debra Chant Although I’m known as a photographer recording people and place, sometimes creative ideas demand different forms of composition. This series of collage was inspired by National Gallery of Victoria magazines someone gave me where pre cut strips of predominately Australian images were glued in sequence from the bottom up to create a landscape around a subject matter – except for ‘faces’ where the subject is also in the landscape.

Unlike collage, our planet can’t be fixed by a bit of cut and paste. What the world needs now is economics that respects people and nature, where the value of the environment is in its preservation not destruction.’

‘hill’

‘bird’

Gratitude 23

‘shed’

‘faces’

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Colac Otway Arts Trail 2020-2021

Sculptural Hat in felt by Jane Bear

by Lynne Richardson What a year it has been for everyone. We planned to run the Colac Otway Arts Trail in October 2020 but COVID changed our plans.

Then we created a simple online trail to keep our momentum.

We ran the arts trail over Easter and the school holidays in April, 2021 with registrations online at our website www. colacotwayartstrail.com.

Dates and locations over 3 weekends included: • 2-4 April 2021 at Apollo Bay and Forrest • 10-11 April 2021 at Colac Art Expo at COPACC and Birregurra • 7-18 April 2021 at Gellibrand and Lavers Hill.

Full details on the Colac Otway Arts Trail website https://www.colacotwayartstrail. com/ Or follow the trails Facebook page or find them on Instagram @colacotwayartstrail

Water Nymph Cast Glass Bowl by Jan Verouden

Margaret Glance

What is Work That Reconnects?

by Anna Swisher

https://youtu.be/Yxp4PqqkXoA

Gratitude 25

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Beauty in Truth The Botanical Art of Margaret Stone The following is an extract from article that originally appeared in The Botanical Artist - Volume 16, Issue 3Elsie Margaret Stones and the Flora of Louisiana By Elaine B. Smyth Melbourne, Australia, 1945. A young art student turned nurse contracts pneumonia. Doctors prescribe eighteen months of bed rest in hospital. Friends and family visit the impatient patient and find her “going mad with boredom.” They bring her paper, pencils, watercolors, and wild flowers, from the nearby Grampian Mountains, to draw. Thus begins the career of one of the twentieth century’s most distinguished botanical artists, which resulted in the creation of three major bodies of work on three continents. Elsie Margaret Stones – always called Margaret – was born in Colac, Australia, southwest of Melbourne, on August 28, 1920. Her father, Frederick Stones, had been a farmer in the district, and her mother, Agnes, came from nearby Terang. The 1920s and 30s were difficult times in Australia, particularly for farmers, who suffered both economic and social upheaval. The Stones family struggled throughout those decades, moving from place to place as farms failed, sometimes unable to live together.

As a child, Margaret loved to draw and despite the upheaval of those early years, her family encouraged and supported her in her artistic endeavours.

After attending Swinburne Girls’ Junior Technical School in Melbourne, she won a three-year scholarship to study Industrial Art at Swinburne Technical College (now Swinburne University of Technology). Already sure of her preferred profession at age fifteen, she entered her occupation in her student records as “artist.” Forced to leave school when her scholarship expired, she earned a living doing commercial art during the day, but continued to study, attending night classes at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School, until World War II intervened.

Although Australia entered World War II in 1939, declaring war against Germany, it wasn’t until December 1941 that the war moved into the Pacific. In 1942, as part of the home-front war effort, Stones began working as

Margaret Stones at the Herbarium, Kew1962

a nurse at the Epworth Hospital in Richmond, a suburb of Melbourne. In late 1945, she contracted pulmonary tuberculosis and was hospitalized. The drawings she made of wildflowers while convalescing attracted the attention of her physician, Dr. Clive Fitts. Through his good offices, her work was seen by Daryl Lindsay, Director of the National Gallery of Victoria, and Robert Haines of Georges Gallery, Melbourne, who gave Stones her first solo exhibition, which opened in December 1946. It was a critical success. In a remarkable burst of productivity, she went on to produce three more gallery exhibitions within four years, while at the same time completing a major commission for a private collector, John McDonnell, attending botany lectures at the University of Melbourne, and spending three summers as part of a botanical expedition to the Bogong High Plains of Victoria.

Her time on the Bogong Plains was the result of another important personal connection made by Clive Fitts, who introduced her to John Stewart Turner, Professor of Botany and Plant Physiology at the University of Melbourne.

Because of Turner, Stones began not only to study botany and its historical development but also the history of botanical illustration, which she has continued to focus on throughout her life. As her knowledge of botany and botanical illustration grew, she grew determined to work and study at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, where distinguished artists had worked with noted botanists since the gardens were founded in 1759.

By 1951, she had saved enough to purchase a oneway passage on a ship bound for England. She made the voyage armed with a letter of introduction from Daryl Lindsay to Harold Wright, a Director of Painting

Gratitude 27

& Drawing, and Colnaghi Gallery, a noted dealer in prints and drawings. Within months, Colnaghi had given her an exhibition, and the firm continued to represent her until the 1970s.

Anigozanthos manglesii, Tribonanthes australis and Conospermum stoechadis (Kangaroo paw and Smoke bush) (c.

1946)

Shortly after arriving in London, Stones found lodgings near Kew, where she continued to live until she returned to Australia in 2002. Soon she was engaged as a freelance artist at Kew, and in 1956 her first drawing – an analytical drawing in pen and ink – was published in Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, the journal affiliated with the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. Over the next twentyfive years, she created the first of her major bodies of work, consisting of more than 400 drawings made for that magazine. When she first arrived at Kew, Stones spent many hours making pen-and-ink drawings of herbarium specimens that had been dried and then boiled to rehydrate them, and dissected under a microscope. Writing about her work later, she noted that this provided invaluable training for botanical drawing for someone with her more general background and training in art. Over time she determined that for her watercolor portraits of plants, she would work only from live specimens, eschewing the use of photographs. She developed the general habit of working indoors, with the specimen and a microscope at hand, but her indoor work was frequently supplemented with field work that gave her a sense of plants’ natural habits and habitats.

During her decades at Kew, she pursued other projects as well. In 1961, Milo John Reginald Talbot, 7th Baron Talbot de Malahide, wrote to Stones to ask her to draw the plants of Tasmania, where he had come into possession of an estate in 1940. Plants were airshipped from Tasmania to Kew for her to draw. By 1962, she had completed forty drawings for him. With that collection of drawings in hand, Talbot de Malahide approached John Roberts of the Ariel Press, London, with an idea for The Endemic Flora of Tasmania. With botanical commentary by Dr. Winifred Curtis and outstanding color printing done by Ariel, the book proved a stunning success. As the stream of air-freighted specimens continued, Stones created 254 drawings to illustrate the six-volume work, which was completed in 1978.

Banksia integrifolia (Coast banksia) (c. 1948)

As the Tasmanian project was drawing to a close, a project in Louisiana began – her last major body of work on a third continent. In 1976, Stones was commissioned to create six watercolor drawings of Louisiana native flora

28

to be a lasting legacy of Louisiana State University’s bicentennial celebration. The LSU community was thrilled with the result, and the project soon blossomed with the support of people throughout the state. Professor Lowell Urbatsch of LSU was recruited as the chief botanical advisor, and dozens of people from all across the state contributed funds and time to make the project a success.

An important difference between the Tasmanian project and the Louisiana work was that Stones’ method of working only from live plant material made it imperative that she visit Louisiana regularly. Unlike the tough Tasmanian flora, Louisiana native plants could not survive air shipment. Stones first visited Baton Rouge in February, 1976, beginning an association that produced not only a significant collection of botanical art but also many enduring friendships.

Eucalyptus preissiana 1963

Writing Beauty in Truth: The Botanical Art of Margaret Stones (the best single source of information about the artist), Irena Zdanowicz describes Stones’ working methods and the demands made by her exclusive use of live specimens: “She works swiftly and instinctively, partly from temperament, but also from a conviction that it is crucial to portray the plant as a living object whose true delineations must be captured before it begins to wilt and its colours change. Not infrequently, the plant’s behavior demands speed of execution….

[On one occasion] the audible click of buds opening on a branch of magnolia – kept overnight in the humid atmosphere of a bathroom – had her leaping from bed in the early hours of the morning to draw them.

The two sketches and the finished drawing of the same specimen of Magnolia macrophylla … document the slight but unmistakable movement of leaves and buds over a short period of time – differences of detail which otherwise could, erroneously, be seen as a case of artistic licence.”

In 1977 Stones was made a Member of the British Empire and in 1988 a Member of the Order of Australia for “service to art as an illustrator of botanical specimens”.

Stones died at Epworth, Richmond, Victoria on 26 December 2018 at the age of 98. She never married.

Images sourced from https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au for educational purposes

Richea scoparia, watercolour over pencil on paper.

Cinnamon Stephens

Dragonfly moon

Jewellery - sea glass earrings and ancient Greek inspired pendant

30

Cinnamon Stephens

LEFT: Waratah in situ TOP: Red Echidna Studios - banksia detail ABOVE: Red Echidna Studios - Barrietta

Gratitude 31

Studio Forrest As a gathering of artists who enjoy working together and individually, each Studio Forrest creative contributes skills and knowledge to the group to produce work on a selected theme. A broad range of artworks in different mediums is the result while having an overall theme adds to the cohesion of the yearly exhibitions and installations.

As “the year like no other” 2020 took hold, Studio Forrest members were determined to continue to produce artworks and support each other during lockdown. This was achieved through meeting online and working individually on projects including sending partial artworks on postcards to each other to finish, mark making with nature brushes, pop-up pages and curiosity boxes. Artists took turns to lead an activity and shared their art and lots of laughs. A great way to stay connected.

As life slowly returns to face to face COVID normal, the group have started working on an outdoor weaving project, River Flows - which you can view on the fence at the Community Hub in Forrest. Studio Forrest is planning an exhibition in March 2021 to share the work produced during 2020. The theme of the exhibition, chosen prior to lockdown, is Fragility=Resilience, quite prophetic considering the year that was.

Studio Forrest is a program of the Forrest Neighbourhood House.

Pop-up page - Trina Ebling

ABOVE: Ecodyeing - Salvina Conti CENTRE: Nature brushes TOP: COVID postcards

St ate of Mind 32

In cognitive psychology and the philosophy of mind, a mental state is a kind of hypothetical state that corresponds to thinking and feeling, and consists of a conglomeration of mental representations and propositional attitudes.

There are several paradigmatic states of mind that an agent has: love, hate, pleasure and pain, and attitudes toward propositions such as: believing that, conceiving that, hoping and fearing that, etc.

Putnam, Hilary (1967).

“The Nature of Mental States”. PhilPapers.

33

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.

Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so you must know pain.

And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy.

— Khalil Gibran

34 Solastalgia is a neologism that describes a form of emotional or existential distress caused by environmental change.

It is best described as the lived experience of negatively perceived environmental change. A distinction can be made between solastalgia linked to mourning what is already lost, and eco-anxiety linked to what may happen (associated with “pre-traumatic stress”, in reference to post-traumatic stress).

The Australian philosopher who coined the word, Glenn Albrecht, describes it as “the homesickness you have when you are still at home” and your home environment is changing in ways you find distressing. In many cases this is in reference to global climate change, but more localized events such as volcanic eruptions, drought or destructive mining techniques can cause solastalgia as well. It was formed by the combination of the Latin words sōlācium (comfort) and the Greek root -algia (pain).

Differing from homesickness, solastalgia refers to the distress specifically caused by environmental change. In 2015, the medical journal The Lancet included solastalgia as a contributing concept to the impact of climate change on human health and well-being.

Source Wikipedia

The age of Solastalgia

Reprinted with thanks from

Glenn Albrecht – Honorary Associate, School of Geosciences, Murdoch University The built and natural environments are now changing so rapidly that our language and conceptual frameworks have to work overtime just to keep up. Under the intertwined impacts of global development, rising population and global warming, with their accompanying changes in climate and ecosystems, there is now a mismatch between our lived experience of the world, and our ability to conceptualise and comprehend it.

No longer is the “wisdom of the elders” relevant to how we should live in the here and now, and this loss of historically informed knowledge has implications for social cohesion.

I experienced the connections between mental health and changes to a once predictable and loved homeenvironment when examining the impact of open-cut coal mining in the Upper Hunter region of NSW. My own eco-biography, the seminal influences in my life that have influenced my feelings about the natural environment, had attuned me to the importance of a positive “sense of place” in people’s lives, and to the significance of what the geographer Yi-Fu Tuan called “topophilia”, or the love of place and landscape.

From the 1980s onwards, under the combined impacts of coal mines, power station pollution, and persistent drought, the people of the Upper Hunter were suffering

from a form of chronic distress that seemed to me to be the opposite of topophilia. Their relationship to their home environment had turned bad.

By the late 1990s the extent of open-cut coal mining in the Upper Hunter was in excess of 500 square kilometres and had changed the landscape in ways that older traditions of underground mining did not. Moreover, the length and severity of drought in eastern Australia was now arguably tied to climate change, driving natural variability into more extreme regimes.

It was this thought that inspired me in 2003 to create a new concept for the English language, one that captured this feeling of chronic distress caused by negatively perceived changes to a home and its landscape. I realised that there was no concept in the English language that adequately described the distressed state of the Upper Hunter residents. The melancholia of nostalgia (nostos – to return home) was close, but had the obvious disadvantage that these people were still living in the place they called home, so were not “homesick” in the traditional nostalgic sense.

As a result of my own background and the testimony of citizens in the Hunter region, I defined “solastalgia” as an emplaced or existential melancholia experienced with the negative transformation (desolation) of a loved home environment.

Solastalgia has its origins in the concepts of “solace” and “desolation”. Solace has meanings connected to the alleviation of distress or to the provision of comfort or consolation in the face of distressing events. Desolation has meanings connected to abandonment and loneliness.

The suffix -algia has connotations of pain or suffering.

Hence, solastalgia is a form of “homesickness” like

State of Mind 35

The changes to the landscape in the Upper Hunter region of NSW severely distressed the people who lived there, a feeling not previously captured in the English language. Glenn Albrecht

that experienced with traditionally defined nostalgia, except that the victim has not left their home or home environment.

Solastalgia, simply put, is “the homesickness you have when you are still at home”.

The concept of solastalgia has had considerable international impact since its creation and has helped revive interest in the relationships between humans and place at all scales. An internet search on the term will produce many thousands of results in many languages and a brief scan of those results reveals that, apart from new applications in academic contexts, artists, composers, musicians, poets, playwrights and hundreds of ordinary people in blogs and websites have understood the need for the term and have used it in meaningful ways.

One of the reasons for international interest in the concept of solastalgia is that we are in the middle of a pandemic of earth-related distress that will only get worse. Everything that was once familiar and trusted in our environment will be experienced as the “new abnormal” as development and climate pressures continue to build.

Worldwide, many are beginning to feel this unease.

Richard Louv, in his book The Nature Principle, discusses solastalgia as an emergent theme in people’s lives, and the reactions to climate change of female Elders living in the Torres Strait can now be understood as a solastalgic response tied to a loss of their sense of place.

Solastalgia gives expression to those gut feelings by creating a whole new psychoterratic (psyche – earth) typology to describe what sensitive people already feel but could not express in language.

The challenge of recognising and responding to the experience of solastalgia is greater than ever.

Unfortunately, small scale, local damage is still happening to loved home environments as globalisation

homogenises urban and rural landscapes. Regional solastalgia is produced under the impact of gas fracking, mining, and agribusiness, as they bring unwelcome damage and pollution on a huge scale to ecocultural and bioregional landscapes.

However, as bad as local and regional negative transformation is, it is the big picture, the Whole Earth, which is now a home under assault. A feeling of global dread asserts itself as the planet heats and our climate gets more hostile and unpredictable.

With a new psychoterratic language to describe and “replace” our emotions and feelings, powerful transformative forces are unleashed. Solastalgia is fixated on the melancholic, but it is also a foundation for action that will negate it. There is a positive side to psychoterratic classifications, one where positive earth emotions and feelings such as biophilia, topophilia, ecophilia, soliphilia and eutierria can be used to counter the negative and destructive.

There is a drama going on in our heads and hearts, where solastalgia can be defeated by the simultaneous restoration and rehabilitation of mental, cultural, and biophysical landscapes.

Now that solastalgia and other psychoterratic terms (both positive and negative) are being established in the research literature and many forms of popular culture, and as recognition of the damage that degraded and desolated environments do to our mental health increases, it is possible that we can respond more effectively to simultaneously restore mental and ecosystem health.

Either we face a pandemic of solastalgia and related negative psychoterratic syndromes as a result of the havoc created by unsustainable development and climate change, or we use our intelligence and creativity to give rise to a world where our positive psychoterratic emotions can thrive.

36

State of Mind 37

Cry Your Tears Cry your tears Cry your tears Cry your tears For the world Cry your tears For yourself For the pain Feel the pain Cry your tears For the joy For the fragility For the exquisite privilege of being in this time Cry your tears Feel the salt on your cheeks Feel the rivulet of the droplet as it descends Into the good green earth Allow your connection To arrive Be reminded of the subtle layers, the subtle Levels in which we all connect Breathing the same air Drinking from the same river Cry your tears Into that river Drink deeply from that river The river of humanity The river flowing Deeply raggedly across this planet

Wipe your eyes Open them Look at the connection Look at the silhouettes On the ridge lines The pollen on the flowers The dust on your shelf This is the stuff of life, of us Hands across time Signs from earth Who knew, who knew this time Of crying our tears Of turning and transition Would be so sweet and so painful Hands across time Hands across fences Join your hands with those of others Find yourself amongst the crowd in stillness Find yourself Know that we all have Our own genius Our own gifts That we We are the sangha, the whanau We are the buddha Together the next buddha Together We come together Stepping into responsibility, urgency Sing the songs of each other’s souls Follow the lines of your breath The lines upon the silhouettes of the ridges To the skyline Follow the lines Inside Deep inside yourself And jump into the flow Taking us where we all need to go….

Ange Palmer 20/6/19 https://www.facebook.com/angepalmerwellnessweaver/

38

Disgust: what is not discussed in Australian politics Gaele Sobott The sky is a dark smoke cloud tinged with orange, it’s difficult to breathe outside. I assist my mother to shower, rubbing shampoo into her hair. I hand her a facecloth to wipe soap from her eyes. We’ve closed the windows and doors to stop ash from coming inside. It’s hot. I’m disabled, 63 years old and my parents are in their late 80s.

My mother is ill and has been in bed for a few months.

It is extremely difficult for her to walk to the shower.

There’s no electricity due to the fires that are raging up and down the south coast of New South Wales. No TV, no internet, no phone coverage. Emergency calls only on my mobile phone. Web-based fire apps aren’t any good to us. I’ve packed the car ready to drive to the evacuation centre at Moruya showgrounds. We are relying on the static reception of the ABC and a battery-operated radio for local emergency updates. I am impressed by the local knowledge and articulate reports of people who phone in about their experiences of the fires. Their reports are invaluable to understanding the trauma and loss, the ferocity of the fires and the extent of devastation.

The waiting is frustrating, I feel underlying and supressed fear. Occasionally, anxiety marks my parents’ voices and actions. My father is blocking the down pipes ready to fill the guttering with water. He is determined to stay and defend the house against ember attack and perhaps even approaching fire. His truck is packed and facing the road.

He says he will go if necessary. There is no use arguing with him. I oil my mother’s finely wrinkled skin, careful not to press too hard; run my hands over her stomach, silently thanking her for bearing my sister and me.

Her thighs are smooth, almost youthful, her ankles thin. I help her into pyjamas and bed and leave her to sleep. ­____________ Now I reflect as I wait. The ABC’s emergency reporting is serving us well, but disgust takes over at the Australian government’s not particularly subtle dismantling by stealth of this vital community and national asset. In fact, I realise disgust has been a more or less permanent emotion over the course of 2019. I’m not usually one for hyperbole but I think in this case it is warranted, not to be taken literally but illustrative of the proportions of my disgust; multi-directional, multi- dimensional, stretching to every extremes of my existence and beyond. I breathe the particulate matter of disgust into my lungs, into my veins, arteries and capillaries, my heart, my brain. It penetrates the subterranean reaches of our earth; the water tables, the aquifers, even, I suspect, the white-hot, molten metal core.

Disgust drifts to where our earth’s atmosphere bleeds into outer space.

State of Mind 39

Most of the time, disgust accompanies feelings of grief crops like almonds that require an average of 13 megalitres and dread. As in early 2019, when close to one million of water a year per hectare. About 90 per cent of Australia’s fish searched for flow, for faster cooler deeper current, cotton is grown in the Murray-Darling basin. Cubbie Station, desperately fighting to breathe in the lower Darling river. located on the Darling Riverine Plains, is the biggest water But they failed, suffocated; their bloated, rotting corpses user and largest cotton farm in Australia. Its storage dams floating on blue-green algae pools, piling up on the banks stretch for more than 28 kilometres. This water is harvested and dry riverbeds. The deaths of 100-year-old Murray from the floodplains and cannot therefore flow naturally cod, golden and silver perch, bony bream with shining to the river. It is believed floodplain harvesting is a major spirit skins haunt me. I grieve for them as I grieve the contributor to the huge drop in flow in the Darling river. A looming death of the Murray-Darling rivers system. I fear significant portion of the water stored in dams is also lost for the lives of farmers, townspeople, wildlife, reptiles, fish, to evaporation. Cubbie has water licences for 460GL or insects, plant life, wetlands and soil that depend on 184,000 Olympic swimming pools. this river system. Geologically speaking, the Instead of addressing how these actions Murray– Darling Basin is over 200 million contribute to reduction of water flow, the years old. The river system stretches Federal Agriculture and Water Resources 3,200 kilometres from Queensland, Minister David Littleproud and his down through NSW, Victoria, the NSW counterpart Niall Blair blame the My top lip curls up Australian Capital Territory then drought. into to the Murray Mouth at on the right side, my ­____________ Goolwa, in South Australia.

throat constricts and I feel

I let disgust go. I must take my mother My top lip curls up on the right nauseous. Disgust oozes something to drink. She is tiny in her side, my throat constricts and bed, covered by red blankets, sleeping.

I feel nauseous. Disgust oozes through my body...

These days, she has almost no appetite. through my body in response to We offer her smaller servings of food, reports that in 2012 after public yogurts, milk drinks; easily digestible with consultation had ended on the draft nutritional powder, banana or blueberry or Barwon-Darling water management yogurt mixed in. As the electricity is off, I mash a plan, the National Party, Primary Industry banana with a fork until it is liquid, whisk it into the milk Minister, Katrina Hodgkinson changed the mixture then strain out any lumps. I may try mashed rules to allow irrigators to extract 32 per cent more avocado next time. We are on a journey of discovery, water during low flows. Disgust that corporate farmer finding out the food tastes and textures that please her. irrigators, many of whom are said to be major National She likes some soups, carrots cooked until they are soft Party donors, have been taking water illegally from the and vegetable risotto. Yesterday, she asked for a cup of tea.

Barwon-Darling and the NSW government has turned a blind eye. Disgust at the massive level of corruption and The police knock on the door. My cousin in Perth is fraud, lack of transparency and obvious disregard for worried as she can’t get in touch with us. One policeman the health of the Murray- Darling river system that are tells us that Mogo, Batemans Bay and places like Malua hallmarks of the government’s water buy backs, waterBay have experienced significant damage from the fire. efficiency projects and capturing of water from overland They say they would prefer my mother and I go to the flow and floodplains. For instance, the federal Minister for evacuation centre today.

Agriculture and Water Resources, David Littleproud, has My father packs a change of clothes and a toothbrush in family links to those charged with Murray-Darling Basin a bag. I prop Mum crookedly against some pillows on her fraud amounting to A$20 million, yet he is still the Minister bed; she manages to drink a small glass of banana milk. I overseeing complaints in a separate investigation of the decide to check out the centre and leave her to sleep. $80 million Murray-Darling Basin scandal involving federal MPs Barnaby Joyce and Angus Taylor.

It’s not far to the Moruya showground. There are a lot I feel disgust at the corporate farming of water-guzzling crops that are not suited to our dry climate: like the annual planting of cotton, with an average irrigation requirement of 7.8 megalitres per hectare and the planting of permanent

of caravans and tents around the oval, horses in various enclosures and other livestock in small buildings. I can hear hens clucking and roosters crowing. People are carrying cats and walking their dogs. The evacuation

40 Disgust: what is not discussed in Australian politics centre volunteers and emergency workers are set up at tables close to the entrance of the indoor basketball court. A man offers his arm to help me walk. I’m thankful.

It’s difficult to negotiate the crowd without my mobility scooter. People, strangers, seem to gain comfort from talking to each other about their experiences, their losses, their fears and their plans for the fires approaching Moruya. I talk to a couple from Canberra who can’t get back because of road closures. Another woman tells me the water is off at South Head. Two elderly men say that the leather shop in Mogo has burnt to the ground. There is a white board with the latest information on the fires, road closures, power cuts and the times when food is served.

I register my parents, myself and the cat with the triage team. The workers try their best to help find a suitable place for us to stay but the accommodation on offer is not accessible. They advise me to try the retirement village near the hospital which has chairs available for the night.

I drive there and speak to the woman in charge. She is efficient and welcoming. The hushed pinks, greens and grey of the interior provide shelter to many elderly people and some disabled young people, all sitting quietly, staff bustling between them. The woman says we should hurry to be assured of a place as they are also expecting elderly people who are being evacuated from the retirement village in Dalmeny.

Back at home, I give my mother a small glass of apple juice. Dad puts an esky full of drinking yogurt and apple juice, a pillow and woollen blanket in my car. I drive to the retirement village with Mum. Two members of staff wheel her inside, I park the car and bring her bag in. She is sitting on a chair, upright, tense, ready to leave. Her eyes are bright blue, buttoned into her pale face, searching for me. I sit next to her, suddenly realising that possibly she thought I had dumped her in a retirement home under the pretext of evacuation and I wasn’t returning. She asks me numerous times why we are here and where my father is. A staff member offers her a sandwich. She refuses to eat with a slight air of indignance. She keeps repeating that she wants to go home. Her confusion and anxiety are increasing rapidly. I tell a member of staff we are leaving, take my mother to the car and we drive.

I’ve lost awareness of dates, days. It’s a weekday, midafternoon. No cars on the road, no people walk the streets and everything seems to glow a dirty, apocalyptic orange.

We drive past the Queens Street Medical Centre. There is a sign on the door that reads ‘Closed due to fires’. Some businesses that rely heavily on the tourist season have

decided to call it quits for good. ATMs don’t work and the few shops that are open require cash. The chemist in the main street and Woolworths are closed. I drive home, hoping it will be possible for Mum to stay one more night in the comfort and familiarity of her own bed.

Dad agrees with this decision. The fire glows red on the ridge north of Moruya. I’m on edge, wondering how I will know if there is an ember attack or if fire approaches during the night. I manage to sleep soundly, waking to the alarm at 6am. Dad helps Mum into the car. We find parking in front of the evacuation centre. It is not too far to walk. I keep talking to her, explaining that we will be staying here for the whole day and night. An emergency worker asks if we would like someone to bring us our meals. I appreciate her assistance. It means we don’t have to join the long queues at the building that serves as a kitchen. A charityvolunteer talks to me about finding a mattress for my mother. Soon, a young man appears with an air mattress. He proceeds to blow air into it. Another volunteer brings sheets and pillows that have been donated. People are helpful. They assist me to walk and carry things. When the electricity goes off, a woman in a bed nearby tells me she is a nurse. She offers to take over from me for a while to fan my mother. Her husband has Parkinson’s and is waiting for his daily medication to take effect. Their two teenage sons are with them. Like many people in here, this family knows the fire has already been through their area but don’t know if their house is still standing. I keep Mum’s fluids up and give her mouthfuls of yogurt from the esky. When a volunteer brings spam and salad sandwiches, surprisingly she eats most of it.

The small dogs are yapping, the parrots squawking but generally the animals in the hall are well behaved.

Time passes slowly. I keep talking to Mum, reassuring her.

Someone says the fire is at North Moruya, firefighters are water bombing near the airport. A volunteer offers me two wet cloths. I put one at the back of Mum’s neck and one in the esky. She asks about Dad a few times, then asks if we can go home soon. I tell her we are staying the night. I don’t know how I am going to help her up from the mattress when she wants to go to the toilet. I speak to the emergency workers about it. The hair around my forehead is wet with sweat. People stop and talk to us. I notice various disabled people of different ages with varied impairments and health conditions. They are accompanied by family and friends. The strength of community in this hall is palpable. People seem to know intuitively how to help each other, their skills are apparent. It is clear that, even without resources, we will make the best of the distressing situation we find ourselves in.

Mum wants to go to the toilet. She tries to get up but cannot. I ask an emergency worker for assistance. She calls another woman. They try to help but hurt Mum by pulling on her arms. She doesn’t complain. An elderly woman sitting across the way gets up and walks over. Her name is Val, she was a geriatric nurse in England. She demonstrates

State of Mind 41 to the women how to help a frail person up from the floor.

Mum is on her feet. I guide her to sit on the walker and push her. We move slowly. I’m not physically strong. The walker helps me balance. There are four toilets and a row of metal basins on the wall. One toilet has a piece of paper taped to the door with ‘For people with upset stomachs’ written across it. Apparently, some form of gastritis is raging through the dogs and the humans in the centre.

When Mum is finished, I rub her hands with sanitiser and we return to our mattress. Even though this experience is hard for her, she is quietly persevering. She lives in the immediate present or in her childhood. She talks to me now about her father, telling me that he was a gentle man.

­____________ Women bring us our evening meal; a sausage with mashed potato and fried onions. One woman asks if she can bring some water with electrolytes.

I say, ‘Yes, please.’

‘It’s cold and it’s electric-blue,’ she adds.

When she returns, Mum has a long drink from the flask.

Then tries to get up. An emergency worker brings two young army reservists who offer their help. Val explains to them how to lift. They do a great job. I ask them how they feel about helping citizens at home. ‘It makes me feel valued,’ one says.

I lay next to her and I think about resilience and about I help Mum to the washbasin and pour water from a how we are made vulnerable by a system that has let bottled so she can clean her teeth. We return to our place us down. How communities that lack resources – poor on the floor and lay down with every intention of sleeping. communities, the disabled, the elderly, First Peoples’ It is noisy and hot. communities – are particularly impacted by disasters like this one. My guts twist in Mum turns to face me. Her eyes seem to look anger and hurt for those in need who right into who I am as if she has some kind of are disregarded or, worse, stigmatised superpower. and punished by government She asks, ‘How are you? How are you I lay next to her and policies. Disgust sets in again at really going in your life?’ I say, ‘I am the repeal of Medevac, stripping I think about resilience good Mum. I have friends. I’m good.’ away the only pathway to and about how we are evacuation from offshore She continues to look at me. detention for sick refugees. made vulnerable by a I have not asked myself this question.

Disgust at the decision to Every day is a struggle. I am selfsystem that has let axe funding to the main body employed, work non-stop and make us down. representing First Peoples women very little money. My work–life balance is survivors of domestic abuse. terrible.

Disgust at Robo-debt’s cruel assault Children run up and down the hall, laughing on our welfare system causing extreme and screaming. The main light in the hall is just distress and, in some cases, suicide. Disgust above us, secured to the backboard of a basketball hoop. at the refusal of government to increase the New ­____________ Start support allowance which, at around $40 a day, which condemns people to live well below the poverty line, barely I return my thoughts to Andrew Forrest and the big covering rent, let alone other essentials. mining companies in Australia. Miners of fossil fuels Disgust that people on the cashless welfare card will like Adani only expect to be viable if they depend on not be able to buy goods during this disaster when the subsidies, favourable deals and tax concessions. Over its shops are demanding payment in cash. Disgust that the thirty-year life, Adani’s Carmichael coal project would be expansion of the cashless welfare card is costing between given at least $4.4 billion in taxpayer subsidies. $4,000 to $10,000 per person to implement and manage.

The miners bring in huge revenues but pay little or no This money could be going directly to income support tax at all. The latest Australian taxation figures record or work programs, education or additional resources and that massive oil and gas producers, like Exxon Mobil infrastructure in areas impacted by high unemployment. with $9.23 billion in Australian revenues, Chevron with It goes instead to Indue Pty Ltd, a corporation said to $5.27 billion and Woodside with $6.28 billion, all paid donate to various Liberal and National Party branches no tax. Gina Rinehart’s company, Hope Downs, with $3.8 nationally. In August 2019, Indue is reported to have billion revenue, does not pay tax. That both our two received up to $21.9 million. If the card is extended to major political parties support coal exports when we every person receiving benefits, the cost to the taxpayer could be developing other export industries including for administration alone will be in the billions. Disgust also renewables, makes no sense. I want to see a breakdown that the Indue card is the result of the sustained efforts of of who exactly benefits from the US$87.7 billion income billionaire mining magnate, Andrew Forrest, who dictates from our 2018 exports of mineral fuels. Given that the that the solution to what he perceives as the ‘welfare demand to decommission coal mines includes a just dependency’ of First Peoples is income management. transition of jobs to renewables, I wonder why there is so

42 Disgust: what is not discussed in Australian politics much emphasis on jobs in the coal industry when just over 37,000 jobs are involved and many mines, including Adani, are automating. There is also little discussion on how the increase in our exchange rate caused by the resources boom negatively affects other job sectors — industries such as tourism, tertiary education, manufacturing, agriculture that employ vastly more people in widely dispersed locations. I feel disgust that we are lied to by politicians like Scott Morrison and the billionaire- owned media. We are not given the information we need to make decisions, we are discouraged from thinking critically.

I feel disgust that Gina Rinehart’s company, Hancock Prospecting, donates millions to the right-wing, climatedenying think tank, Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) which has close links to the Liberal party and to Murdoch’s media. Murdoch News Australia pays no tax, despite $2.4 billion in revenues from its papers and websites. The same media spreads clearly disproven disinformation that arsonists, not climate change, are responsible for the continuing fire disaster we are experiencing in Australia.

I am equally disgusted when, in September 2019, Donald Trump hosts a state dinner in honour of Scott Morrison accompanied by guests Gina Rinehart and Andrew Forrest, billionaire media magnates, Seven West Media chairman Kerry Stokes, News Corp’s Lachlan Murdoch and billionaire Anthony Pratt. These are the important players in Australia’s oligarchy. This is where power resides.

I assume oligarchs can helicopter out of a danger zone if they ever find themselves in one. They can afford to ‘adapt’ to climate change by building bunkers into their holiday homes. We never expect to share space with an oligarch in an evacuation centre. ­____________ The generator stops. The lights go out. An emergency worker fiddles with an electricity cable.

My mother asks, ‘Can we go home in the morning?’ ‘I think so,’ I say and turn over to sleep.

The generator starts up again. I wake to the light flickering in my face. Most people in the hall appear to be asleep.

Mum is trying to get out of bed. She thinks she is at home.

I explain that we are in the hall, that we have evacuated.

She asks where my father is. A volunteer comes to help her up. I can now see bruises on Mum’s arms, her hips and knees are sore. Val comes over and instructs the woman how to lift. Val also lifts. I wheel Mum to the toilet. It is too late. She has wet herself. I wheel her back to the bed and

pack our bag. We pass by the tables near the entrance and sign out. I explain that I can’t continue to put Mum through this. A young man helps us to the car. I don’t know if we are still under threat from fire. We drive home.

Both Mum and Dad sleep through the next day. I listen to the ABC. A neighbour knocks. He tells me we must boil our drinking water because it is now being mixed with water that comes directly from the river. He says the supermarkets are empty. There is no food, no fuel. I take two cans of Irish stew from the cupboard. That will do us.

As the days roll by, we are lucky; the electricity is back on and so is the phone and Internet. Many communities are still waiting for the electricity to be restored. A truck load of supplies gets through under police escort. The food is gone from the supermarket by lunchtime. ­____________ My father has an appointment with an Aged Care Assessor who will assess him for Home Care Packages (HCP) level 2. She tells us that her house, north of Moruya, is under threat from the renewed fire danger forecast for the weekend. She will move into town with her in-laws. As we talk, the lack of transparency and brokenness of the aged care system become obvious. Unlike the NDIS, where disabled people at least have the option of selfmanagement, the elderly must use providers. Some providers are said to charge elderly people up to 50% of their government subsidy for administration. Comparing provider charges is an almost impossible task as the formats are not standardised. I ask the assessor if she can explain the announcement made over Christmas by the federal government that private companies will deliver assessments from April 2021. She doesn’t know about it.

More than 400,000 assessments are done every year for home-care packages and residential care, at a cost of $800 per assessment.

Disgust settles in the room once again as I realise this is another opportunity for private enterprise to pocket public funds. The assessor explains how, to date, stateemployed nurses, social workers and geriatricians work through community health and public hospitals to assess the level of care required by individual elderly people. She doesn’t think private providers will have the community knowledge, expertise or concern for the individual to provide this service. She is worried that, without the involvement of state and local government structures, there will be even less transparency and little accountability. She gets up to go, saying to Dad that it will take up to two years for his package to come through once it is approved.

He says, ‘Well, I may not be here by then.’ He adds, ‘But I don’t want to shoot the messenger.’

I follow her out the door, holding onto the wall for support. ­____________

State of Mind 43 The road to Batemans Bay has just opened. I want quotes for an adjustable bed for my parents, so Mum can sit up in bed to eat. I drive through smouldering, blackened forests. Twisted sheets of roofing iron mark the spot where houses, sheds and businesses have burned to the ground. Smells of burnt wood intermingle with the acridity of charcoaled animal flesh. The agony of a young kangaroo, its body seared to a fence, is captured by a photographer, singeing the psyche of the world. One billion animals estimated killed in the fires. Unknown numbers of invertebrates, insects, frogs, bats dead.

Possible catastrophic consequences to ecosystems. More than 2,000 homes and eight million hectares burned. Vast areas of bushland will not regenerate. At least twenty-four people killed and the fires continue.

The bleak, ashen husks of trees that now comprise Eurobodalla Botanical Gardens are a blur as I drive back to Moruya. It dawns on me that, just like hyperbole, disgust has a purpose. Feelings of disgust are an evolutionary response to protect us from pathogens, infectious threats.

Disgust helps us protect and preserve the social order from something that is offensive, poisonous or dangerous.

Disgust is about survival.

Federal Defence Minister goes on holiday to Bali while this land is suffering a profound disaster of apocalyptic proportions. Disgust runs out my ears, oozes from every pore and orifice at the arrogance with which the Prime Minister responds to public concerns on how to compensate and properly equip volunteer fire crews who have been battling the fires since September. Disgust at the forced handshakes and thuggish behaviour he imposes upon the traumatised community of Cobargo. I cannot possibly talk about everything that disgusts me.

There is too much. This is why I choose to represent my disgust through hyperbole.

­____________

My disgust calls for totally different ways of living and producing, and different ways of relating to each other and the earth. I don’t think anybody knows yet what this will look like, but I’m sure the oligarchs must not have any say in shaping it.

Carbon-fuelled accumulation of capital, greed and everincreasing profit margins are dangerous to life on earth.

People in Sydney have been breathing toxic, smoke-filled Our survival will involve us developing confidence in air for months. People on the south coast are breathing our ability to respect life, to love and help each other, smoke. On the 1 January 2020, Canberra’s air quality is confidence in our skills and our knowledge, so that we the worst of any major city in the world. On 8 January, the Bureau of Meteorology may work within our communities, upwards and announces that 2019 was Australia’s outwards, joining with other communities hottest and driest year on record. for the common good. Our survival will Yet our government acts as if it is depend on us learning how to recognise business as usual, touting that My disgust calls for and actively fight corruption, fraud we’ve had fires since time began. and lies. It will mean we find ways to totally different ways of make reliable information available The 2008 Garnaut Climate living and producing, and to all, support and build progressive, Change Review examined the independent media, develop critical scientific evidence around the different ways of relating to thinking and make decisions based on impacts on Australia of climate each other and the earth. change and predicted that, facts not lies. without adequate action, the I read that on 31 December in Victoria, nation would face a longer and more Veronica Marie Nelson Walker, a 37-yearintense fire season by 2020. old Yorta Yorta woman is charged with Disgust almost overpowers me that this shoplifting and refused bail after representing and other warnings are ignored. That Scott herself at Melbourne Magistrates’ Court, instead she is Morrison chooses not to meet with the twenty-three remanded at the Dame Phyllis Frost maximum security former fire and emergency leaders who ask to discuss women’s prison. On 2 January she is found dead in her early preparation and the equipment needed to fight the cell. Our survival depends on urgently building solidarity impending fire disaster. Disgust that, under the 2019-20 with those who are discriminated against, racialised, NSW state budget, fire and rescue capital expenditure criminalised and murdered by the laws and system that is cut by $28.5 million or 35 per cent. The Rural Fire are supposed to protect us. We know the violence against Service capital expenditure budget is cut by $49.9 First Peoples, disabled people, women, refugees, the million or 75 per cent. Disgust that the Prime Minister elderly and other oppressed groups of people is linked. sees fit to go on holiday to Hawaii, the NSW Minister for The brutality of this system is lethal.

Emergency Services goes on holiday to Europe, and the

­____________

I stand by Mum’s bed, looking at her curled warm in her blankets. She asks, ‘Do we have to evacuate again?’

‘No,’ I say, lying next to her. She talks about her father being on the susso. She describes how, during the war, at school they did drills, practised climbing down into trenches in the Exhibition gardens.

‘I don’t think the world has ever been in as much danger as it is in now,’ she says, placing her hand on my hand.

Gaele Sobott Posted on May 31, 2020.

44

Looking out over the fjord I count the years Fran Cairns Today I watched over the fjord counting the years since I fell in the ocean of your loving.

Captivated, as the water in fathoms immeasurable, between sculpted cliff and boulder, leaning shoulder to shoulder, like the hours and days passing.

Keepers of memory and time, these ancient guides, watermarks indelibly scribed in their sides.

Adrift I glide free, buffeted by wind and fierce lunar tide like the crevices of loose scree that tumble and fall in random play coming to rest as they lay, held by one, balanced by the other.

Light dances, reflecting the radiance in your eyes, illuminating depths that sway to the longing of the moon, as eternal and mysterious as my love for you.

State of Mind 45

James Eric Watkins Poems

inside purple chosen path: inside purple always leads to green

shadow sparrows shadow sparrows gather and feed pretending to be leaves

46

Summer On The Painkalac

by Gregory Day

I swim around the riverbends with a childhood friend. The water is fresh but ancient, silken, sepia, then golden when catching the western light. It holds a mirror under our chins as we breaststroke and talk.

My friend lives these days in Hong Kong, a city he calls the New York of Asia. He looks for patches of good humour in a seriously busy life. He also looks out for cul de sacs of nature in his Blade Runner-ish city: an Atlas moth on his doorjamb, a Chinese porcupine on the small patch of forested hill behind his apartment building.

As we approach the new jetty the shire has recently installed at the wide riverbend three goggled holidaymakers, evenly spaced across the river, freestyle towards us. They’re obviously not past masters at this as their strokes make quite a foaming splash and racket. By comparison our breaststroke seems almost stealthy.

Something however alerts them to our presence because suddenly, just as we’re beginning to divert towards the reeds, their arms stop flailing, their heads spring up, and

they remove the goggles from their eyes. They express complete surprise at our presence.

‘Get back in your lane,’ my friend jokes. The holidaymakers scan our faces, computing, assessing us for balances of irony and seriousness; then, laughing, one joins in on the mirth: ‘Sorry,’ he says, ‘but I couldn’t see the line on the bottom.’

This ‘silly season’ banter is disarming. They regoggle, we pass on by their commotion, with only the paddocks and the northern sky above the hills ahead of us now.

We continue slowly towards the wide riverbend where in the aftermath of the humour swallows begin to duck and weave between our ears. The swallows’ movements are expert, balletic, hi-tech. They are the rivertop connoisseurs, we are a visitation from another world, a world of ingenious but often fearfully excessive infrastructure.

Now we are swimming into the middle of the wide open bend we have both known since we were born. It is more an elbow than a bend actually, as its turn is something like a hand-drawn 90 degrees, but a bend is what we have always known it as. A close family friend drowned himself here as an old man to avoid social services. He got up one night in his pyjamas and dressing gown, walked down the little slope from his house behind the pub, folded his bedclothes on the bank as he had been taught as an orphaned child, and jumped into the water like the swaggie in the song. Sometimes these days people use this man’s name to denote the bend. Butler’s bend, they say. But not Butler’s elbow.

State of Mind 47

Through his long and quiet life here in town Joe liked often to wander in for a stout at the pub, so to use elbow would be confusing. For those in the know it would most probably conjure up pictures of him on his stool at the bar.

Or behind the bar back in the days when he was publican.

So Butler’s bend it is.

As we enter the expanse of the bend we see what a fabulous spring it’s been for grass. It stands tall in its multishades of green, hale and happy along the far paddock bank. We breaststroke smoothly through the riverskin. We look and discuss modern life as we go, family, politics, work: we are a bit like two banjo frogs twanging along in old and familiar water.

On the southern uncultivated bank to our left, a bank that only recently was rife with boneseed, ragwort and flax-leaf broom, but where now, thanks to a group of local weedhaters, native herbs are aspray and beaded glasswort prospers in its segmented succulence, we watch for the kangaroos who usually browse on that spot at this time of evening. I tell my friend how the roos make me nervous at times, because of the story of old Reg Vowells and his curly retrievers. Back in the day, those soft-mouthed dogs of Reg loved nothing better than to swim across to the wild bank and hound the roos around and around amidst the acres of sedge, boobialla, weed and tufted common reeds, as if they’d stumbled into some ideal canine video game. Then one day the curly retrievers’ fun came to a halt. One of the dogs, in full slobbering chase, was led on by a big buck roo to the river. The roo jumped in and the excited retriever followed, whereupon the buck promptly swivelled about and drowned the dog with a breathtaking deftness.

These days when I am swimming alone and I see the roos right there, first feeding then periscoping their ears as they register my sibilant approach, I imagine the horror of them jumping in beside me. Wincing, I visualise the rip and tear of those prehistoric talons, my pale skin sliced open, my crimson blood spilling into the sepia stream. I sense the atavistic defence of their domain, their mastery of a habitat that I, as a house-dwelling human swimming in boardshorts, am still at least one remove from.

Anyway, today there are no roos down amongst the brookweed tendrils, no threat amongst the palette of glaucous goosefoot and the summer-reddened glasswort.

And so we swim smoothly by.

A few minutes beyond Joe’s bend we arrive at the pomaderris hut, on the southern bank about halfway along the next straight stretch of river. The Wybelena hill is straight in front of us in the west: pyramidal, ironbark-clad,

with these days the town mobile phone tower perched jagged and grey in a roughly dozed gash at its apex. We can hear the roar of ocean off beyond the hummocks in the south. Treading water I peer through the foliage and point out the hut to my friend. My kids and their friends built it over the quiet winter months, hiding it deep inside a copse of boobiallas. It’s in a great spot, out of sight of any house or road or pathway of town, unless you bother to leave the land and swim or canoe upstream. What looks like a random pile of bosky bush is actually watertight cladding on a knobbly frame, worked on secretly all through the snakeless time, and now left unattended through the warmer months, when those same sleeping snakes are awake and weaving like Celtic lace in the sun.

I can see that my friend – whose name is John - is happy that the hut exists. Its dishevelled existence seems a long way from the sheep-like tourist traffic of this time of year, when police helicopters hit the sky, and the crowds come like the Peterburgets and Peterburgenkas swarming to their summer dachas in Dostoyevsky’s The Idiot. John is happy because, despite the naysayers, the kids’ hut is proof that free range childhoods still do occur.

We tread water there for a few minutes, discussing the ins and outs of hut-form, as memories upmerge in us from the depths of our middle-life. We begin to talk of when we were young on this same riverflat, young and ‘free’ and brutal, cheeky and ignorant, but as fit as the roos. We laugh at some of those old events: the daggy new year’s eve square dance we boated to upstream, the day we chucked yabbies all over the kitchen walls of some girls we liked (such an elegant way of expressing our attraction!).

Then we swivel in the dark layers of the water, and stretch out, silently kicking our feet down low and spreading our arms to propel us back into the rhythm of our swim.

Now amongst the pastoral grass on the opposite bank to the hut, the cultivated paddock bank, we notice three welcome swallows perched superlightly on the tender stems. The swallows make a tiny vignette amongst the vertical cluster of the grass. It is like haiku but in three dimensions, like something you might see under a Japanese glaze. The way the swallows are positioned also reminds me of music, of bird-notes on a grass-stave, a small living notation.

I say nothing to John but am filled with pleasure at the scene. Despite everything that is going on in the world we are but two seeing-bodies in the river after all, 90% immersed, with no visible appendages, only our heads poking out into the clarifying light.

48 Summer on the Painkalac I see John looking at the three grassperching swallows as we go by. The way they sit so nimbly there. ‘That’s pretty,’ he says. In the normal run of life John is never without his mobile phone, just like I’m pretty fond of my iPad. We both agree that these so-called ‘devices’ are actually much more. They are supercomputers, augmenting our bodies, our memories, fragmenting the ancient constraint of our geographies. Because we are in the river, in only bathers and skin, I am aware that John’s normal impulse to grab for his phone and photograph what has pleased him is thwarted. Swimming side by side I feel that, despite the difference in our lives these days, we are already retuning to each other. I almost inhabit my old friend’s skin as I intuit his impulse to reach for the impossible technological adjunct.

Still looking at the three welcome swallows as we swim quietly by - their russet throats, their Prussian-blue wings - I say: ‘You know the best thing about that scene, John?”

‘No, what?’

‘It’s not on Instagram.’

He smiles, then says, ‘I was just thinking what a great photo it would make.’

We leave the swallows behind and swim on. We swim past the small bunch of persistent blackberry bushes that I’ve been checking regularly for the annual harvest.

The flower has just turned to hard budding fruit, so it shouldn’t be long. We swim past the slowly dying riverflat redgums where the old kangaroos, or go-im, as they were once called in these parts, seek the morning shade on particularly anthropocenic summer days. We swim past the stately black ironbarks at the base of the Wybelena hill, that look as if they’ve lived forever. Perhaps they have. In the past they were used by the Wadawurrung as sepulchre trees, for sky burials. Their name was ngangahook. When local squatters like my own ancestors defined the pastoral lease around here during the nineteenth century land grab they named the lease with that word but left off the glottal ng sound at the beginning. The trees, the place, the river, the sea, were all now being looked at with faraway eyes, the sounds they made were heard with different ears, named with a different configuration of the mouth, tongue and throat. With a European alphabet.

Beginning with a.

We swim into the ironbark shadows and rest for a time, chatting. Like when we were kids we don’t talk about the trees. We joke, make each other laugh, and comment on the houses crowding the eastern hill-lines of the town.

Finally we turn and swim back the way we came. It’s strange how, when you’re breast- stroking along at water level, some stretches of the river seem to be flowing uphill and some downhill. The stretch flowing south back out of the ironbarks seems to be going up and the stretch that runs back past the hut seems to be going down. How does that work? No matter how many times my mariner friends explain it to me I’ll never understand. All I know is that illusions are everywhere in the landscapes of water, and that fact alone has always made them somehow talismanic to me. The imaginative world never exists initself, but always as a collaboration with our senses, and with mood and feeling.

When we get back to the wide open water of Butler’s bend we see that, while we’ve been upstream, three humans have taken up positions on the new shire jetty on the town bank. Three people: one man, two women. The man is dressed in a rather debonair fashion: light linen jacket, shoes with heels, a summer trilby. The women are also looking fine. One of them films with her phone as the other two sit on the picnic rug they have lain over the jetty planks, clinking their champagne glasses in a festive new year mood. In that moment the newfangled shire jetty is a celebratory jetty, and I make a mental note. The thing is, when the jetty was built a few of us who live with the river as a store of defragmentation and joy, and who want the riverbank to remain ‘natural’, decried the jetty as unnecessary, an excess, an environmental tautology.

John and I swim along a little more self-consciously now, like a couple of top-end crocs with the potential to break the happy tourist moment on the new jetty.

But no, the voice of the woman with the phone splits the air. ‘Good evening!’ she calls, glancing us out of the corner of her eye while continuing to train the screen on her friends. Her words ring out across the water.

‘Hello,’ John says in bass response, from our stealthy level in the wet brown water.

And then, perhaps because of the fact that I’d mentioned Instagram to John upstream, and therefore had the phone issue rattling about somewhere in my mind, I couldn’t help myself.

In suddenly pointed yet quite affable cheer, with the jetty-three still clinking their champagne glasses and the filming woman capturing it all on her arm’s length supercomputer, I call out cheekily: ‘What do you think would happen if you weren’t filming that?’

State of Mind 49 The woman with the phone is surprised. She pauses, factoring everything in. Even in the soft evening light I can see her face cogitating. I want to say then that it’s not because I don’t battle my own digital urges that I’ve asked the question. No, it’s just that in the free motion of the river the words came flowing out of me before I could throw up a weir.

The river waits. How will this turn? I wonder.

Eventually I notice her face relax. The question drew closer to its answer. What would happen if she stopped filming her happy moment with her friends? Opening her arms wide, she finally replies: ‘Well, it wouldn’t exist!’

What I say next is not exactly true but because of her good cheer I call it out anyway. ‘That’s what I thought you’d say.’

Of course that wasn’t actually what I thought she’d say but something in me did think that that was what she may, somewhere in the currents of her being, actually suspect.

Or fear. It’s likely too that from time to time my own feet in the river have given a little extra scissor-kick at the thought that if all this wasn’t recorded, edited, posted, or published, it simply wouldn’t exist.

Anyway, now that we’d come this far and had enough ebullience to communicate as strangers across the unifying river, I took an even bigger gamble and said: ‘Well. It puts a new spin on Descartes doesn’t it.’

The mind is as quick as any galaxial beam. I had decided, in the time it takes a go-im to drown a dog, or a swallow to land on a grass stem, to make the quite unlikely move of bringing the French philosopher into it. Looking back, I suspect this may have been partly because the woman was, either consciously or unconsciously, referring in her phrasing to his most famous maxim, but it was also because I had decided that it wouldn’t matter in the end if a bunch of visitors on the jetty had no idea who Descartes was or whether or not I was barking mad. Perhaps though such a decision had something more to do with the playful confidence we are afforded by the gravity-free zone of river swimming.

So yes. ‘Well. It puts a new spin on Descartes doesn’t it,’ I said.

The woman holding the supercomputer looked nonplussed at first, but before she could put words to her disorientation it was the dapper man in the summer trilby and cream linen jacket who took up the baton. He saved the moment from veering flat, he deepened the open riverbend even further. Laughing, with champagne glass in hand, and nodding in acknowledgement, he said, ‘Yes, yes, I film therefore I am!’

My smile spread easily above the river. The woman with the supercomputer seemed to relax again then too, and

even to understand, as if some distant undergraduate memory had been jogged. It was the same with John. He remembered as well.

But then the dapper man went one better and managed to improve upon his initial response.

‘No, no,’ he cried, triumphant and full of panache. ‘iPhone therefore I am!’

We continued on our way then and the man wished us a lovely evening and thanked us for decorating what was already for him a happy scene. We continued quite cheerily beyond Joe’s bend, heading due south, finding our way back into the always uphill- seeming home stretch of the river. We were two childhood friends breaststroking in sync, past the lemon-scented gum where the landrail lives, past the striated stumps of the original jetty site of yore, where we used to fish on baking timbers as small children in the 1970s, in the days before we knew any of the ancient local names for things, let alone what the word tautology meant.

Eventually we arrived back at the river-rope, which hangs from a battle-scarred manna- gum opposite the Carroll’s old house. A big tiger snake’s been living in the bushes there since just before Marg Carroll died so we know to give it a wide berth. I have swum with the snake in the river there though, and so have my children. Its name is kaan. Or kangalang. I tell John how when a new resident put up handmade texta-drawn signs alerting visitors to the snake it had the happy effect of keeping people away from the river. An old fashioned quiet had temporarily returned. Kaan and us were free to swim in peace. Even fear can sometimes have wonderful consequences.

John and I stopped just there but rather than climbing out and swinging from the rope like we might have done once, we treaded water and peered into the opposite bank, where over the previous few weeks I’d watched a white guano nest being secretly fashioned amongst the boobialla branches by a willie wagtail couple. There, I whispered to John, nodding my head but not wanting to point in case anyone walking by on the river road might see me and be alerted to the nest. John peered in the direction and then we both could see the female wagtail, the thin white markings of her glossy black brows, sitting snug but wary in her pottery nest.

I was keen to look but not to linger, to observe the nest but to move slowly by, so as not to distress the mother bird unnecessarily on her eggs. John was more inquisitive.

Because he lives a long way away nowadays and was only visiting his family home for the new year, he hadn’t seen the nest being constructed like I had. Thus he was enchanted, and naturally super curious. He veered off on a slow diagonal towards the musty aqueous shadows of the boobialla fronds.

50 Summer on the Painkalac

By this stage I’d gone on ahead a bit, and was quietly willing him to realign to the centre of the river and to come on up beside me and swim on. I didn’t want to say anything though, I wanted him to sum it all up for himself. I was confident he would. John’s father Hec had been a great champion of the riverbirds when we were young, a real classic twitcher complete with binoculars and stats. I felt sure that the son of Hec wouldn’t trespass much further.

And so it went. Once again two old friends were tuned in by the river and voila!, John veered away from the tableau of nest and frond, tree and stream, mother and child. He stroked his way back towards me. Then, with our chins resting on the soft ledge of the rivertop, we swam on side by side for the last little stretch we had remaining.

Finally approaching the spot under the pines where we’d begun our swim an hour or so earlier we caught sight of John’s sister and her farmer-husband walking along the river road. John had told me earlier that he was expecting them. They were coming down for the new year celebrations from their grape farm in northern Victoria.

‘G’day,’ we called. ‘G’day,’ they replied.

‘Have you done a lap?’ his sister Anne called then, with smiling ironic eyes, as if a lap of such an intricately curling thing as our eely river would ever be possible.

John and I chuckled, causing micro-flurries of humour in the stream. Then I saw the insignia of a familiar football team on John’s sister’s farmer-husband’s cap. Immediately I made a jovial remark across the water, as if to say: despite how things may have changed around here and in the world at large, despite the rise in the price of everything and the gap between rich and poor, and how that means the old town seems at times to have been invaded by cold fish and stressy gentry, despite the fact that barely known French philosophers are these days being discussed openly from the centre across to the edges of the stream, we still know how to extend a good ol’ down-to-earth gumbranch of camaraderie.

A half-shouted conversation thus ensued, about John’s brother-in-law’s footy team, the season just gone, the season ahead, me in the river, he on the bank, moving us along towards the end of our swim. Though he didn’t have a loudhailer we were I suppose a little like a rower and his coach, calling across the divide between water and land. It was fun, and we seemed to agree on the important things.

Suddenly then, before we knew it, John and I had arrived back at our starting point. Suddenly too we’d emerged from the waters and were standing upright in the somehow less rarefied and certainly cooler air of normal life.

John’s sister and her farmer-husband came over and shook our hands warmly by way of saying an official hello.

Perhaps, if you were watching all this from a distance, you might have imagined this shaking of our hands as a form of congratulations for some great river swim John and I had just completed. We had swum the English Channel hadn’t we? We had forded the wild Orinoco. Surely we had braved the eye of the needle and crossed Bass Strait?

No, we had merely performed ordinary feats in familiar summer waters. We had swum our way back into the magic of our childhood river. As one year was finishing and a new one beginning we had managed not to drown in nostalgia. We had allowed ourselves instead to be carried side by side in the old current, letting the place and its multi-storied spirit touch our skin. We had refreshed the past to use as ballast for the future. We had allowed the river, for an hour or so, to retune our receptors and detune our limbs.

Temporarily at least it had washed away what ails us all, the glary politicking on dry land, our click & swipe addictions, all the unnecessary distance we put between one another.

As I walked back to my house I thought of that willie wagtail on its pottery nest and the old Wadawurrung name flew into my mind. Yellpillup. The tail wags for sure but that alone could never describe the whole bird.

State of Mind 51

Bereft Gaele Sabott It decays grey on asphalt

like a discarded jumper wet

at land’s edge where the lake laps salty against the mangroves

and the wind squalls grit between the feathers

that made it once a bird camouflaged under a drab sky

except for nuptial plumage his orange punk spikes, a glorious crown for courting with gravelly croaks moans, graak and graaw aerial twists and pirouettes neck-stretching dance shaking twigs to bond with mate

to build a nest high in trees

and raise hatchlings

he lies grey on asphalt

one dry leg at awkward angle wing lifted

shoulder joint still a natural hinge

for flying dead the wind abates the wing closes on rotting pectorals

tangled hair veiling my eyes

face sticky with salt I bend my head

an indecent voyeur an uninvited mourner

52

In between places Greg Roberts

Life seems full of ‘in-between’ places, threshold moments, (sometimes called liminal spaces) that shift us out of where we were, what we were doing and what we thought we were going to be doing.

“I am writing to see if you are interested/able to create an article for a forthcoming online publication of Otway Journal?” That’s how this article got started - a message from a friend that I hadn’t spoken to for some time, bringing memories of a place that I loved living in, until life led me to other places.

State of Mind 53

Change is inevitable and nothing stays the same. Yet human beings seem destined to connect and attach to other people, things and places, while knowing that these connections change or end. In an effort to minimise the amount of daily change we have to face, we build routines and create parts of our lives that seemingly stay the same.

Consider the way we wake up each day, get out of bed, move through the space we live in and engage in activities that are part of our routine – exercises, making tea or coffee, connecting to other people in our home, opening the curtains, checking our phones?

Grief points us towards noticing what has been most significant, loved and needed in our lives. The feelings of grief call us to slow down, reflect and give time and space to address the change or loss that has happened.

Grief invites us into an ‘in-between’ space that creates the possibility of a different present and future by bringing a focus to the things in life that have been important to us.

Kahlil Gibran, captures this beautifully when he suggests that “When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.”

We each, individually, create these routines, based on our own sense of what is needed to help us begin our day and keep connected to the people and things that are important to us. Our morning routine helps us navigate the ‘in-between’ space that exists between sleep and the activities of daily life. These everyday routines are our own creative response to the uncertainty of the ‘inbetween’ spaces in life. Creativity is not just for artists and craftspeople!

By looking into our hearts, grief can invite us to distil the essence of what is important from our past, blend it with our current circumstances and allow us to move into the future where we take our experiences and connections with us, rather than leaving them behind. This distillation process requires time, space and the ability to spend time ‘in-between’ our past and future, a threshold space that is full of hope and potential and yet also full of doubts and uncertainty.

It seems that creativity itself is born in these ‘in-between’ spaces of life. Sometimes we plan to change things and deliberately put our daily routines on pause, giving ourselves space to be creative. Sometimes life and the world around us, puts our daily routines or even life, on pause and we are called to be creative in the way we manage our changed circumstances. Either way, life is full of opportunities to bring something new into existence every time change happens.

The liminal space of grief can be a very uncomfortable place and in order to dwell there and open ourselves to creating a different life, we need anchor points and ways to feel safe enough. Anchor points allow us to see that we don’t have to let go of everything. Even when life thrusts us into the unknown, we can still take notice of the things that haven’t changed while also accepting and adjusting to what has changed. I like to call these anchor points ‘little pools of normal that you can dip your toe into’.

This year, the whole world has shifted into an unexpected and extended ‘in-between’ space with daily routines shifted, changed and unsettled by the effects of COVID-19.

Many lives have been put on pause and this has opened a space for a creative response to what has changed. This is not to suggest that change is always good or comfortable because with every change there will be some level of grief and no two people experience change or loss in the same way.

One of the useful anchor points is to simply notice our breath - notice the air coming in through our mouths and noses, travelling into our body, expanding our abdomen and chest slightly, before rising back up through our bodies and back out into the world through our nose and mouth. This cycle is there with us all day every day and it can anchor us as we navigate times of change.

Grief is another feature of the ‘in-between’. Sometimes our grief is obvious and sometimes our grief is so subtle that we don’t immediately recognise it and yet it is there and will find ways to show itself and guide us if we are willing to take notice.

Our human drive to connect and attach to what we love and know opens us to the grief that comes with change.

Anxiety, fear, relief, yearning and confusion are just some of the emotions that are a part of grief and yet love, joy, hope and gratitude are also part of grief. While grief is often a very uncomfortable experience, it also calls us to recognise the importance of what once was and in many ways, still is significant.

As I bring this article to a close I’d like to invite you to consider the anchor points in your life that allow you to spend time ‘in-between’ and at times of grief. Is it the smell of your morning coffee? Noticing the cool breeze on your face at the end of a warm day? Walking in a forest and noticing the smell of the bush? Looking into the eyes of a loved one? Remembering a moment of feeling calm?

Perhaps it is just pausing where you are right now and noticing what you feel grateful for? Maybe it is realising what is most important to you in life?

Greg Roberts is a Social Worker and Counsellor who specialises in the field of grief, loss and bereavement.

Greg and his family lived in Barwon Downs for a few years and he counts that time as one of the happiest in his life.

54

State of Mind 55

Meet Simon Rigg - Artist and Nature Lover Nettie Hulme I first met Simon about thirty years ago when I worked as his attendant carer for the early morning shift in his Castlemaine home. His gentle demeanour and compassionate, thoughtful approach to this crazy world, despite his daily hardships, impressed me and it was a delight to be with him. Working in a physically intimate space lends itself to intimate discussions when two like-minded souls connect.. Many sessions were spent discussing the woes of the world while we went about the work, making it a smooth transition into the day proper.

Sweet memories of a time now long past but etched in my mind with fondness and gratitude.

That was in the early nineties and Simon had been living with the challenges of quadriplegia for ten years.

Quadriplegia, also known as tetraplegia, is the paralysis of the body from at least the shoulders down. In 1982 Simon was a busy young man. He was working as a landscape gardener for the local hospital and, at the same time, building a house for his young family that included three children under the age of five, when he fell off the roof and broke his neck. And just like that, in a few seconds, his life was changed and there was no going back to what was before.

56 Meet Simon Rigg - Artist and Nature Lover

Simon learnt to paint by holding the brush with his mouth during his rehabilitation at the Austin Hospital, searching for a way to distract himself from the frustrations foisted upon him by his change in fortune. It was something to take his mind ‘out of himself’ that at the same time provided a means of emotional expression.

Art has been a saving grace and Simon joined the Mouth and Foot Painting Artists finding a community of support which has been life enriching. Simon had been inspired by meeting Bill Mooney who had taken up painting by mouth after a diving accident aged 16 years. Here was a man living in his own home and able to support his family through his art. A meaningful and useful life despite the physical disadvantages. The MFPA offers practical and financial support to student members in the form of a stipend scholarship for art supplies and tuition, as well as the opportunity to sell their work. Once an artist is a full member they receive a salary for life, even if they are not able to continue painting Fast forward several decades and Simon has exhibited all over Australia and entered the Archibald Prize.

“That was two years ago. It didn’t get in or anything but you’ve got to have a go at things like that,” he says. Which is a typical statement from this man who has seemingly limitless resilience and forbearance to deal with the unending trials and tribulations associated with living with quadriplegia.

I asked Simon what gets him through the hard times.

“Nature is my god. I get outside as much as I can, even if it is just here in the backyard of my Warrnambool home, I can find solace in all types of weather. I meditate in my own way. Keeping away from the human rat race as much as I can, breathing in and feeling a part of the natural world is what keeps me sane. Of course painting is very important to me but I can’t do as much as I would like to at the moment because my spine is collapsing and I can’t move my neck as I need to. But I have a lot of love in my life, a lot of love. I really feel this love all around me. With my family, friends and a special sweetheart, I feel truly blessed.”

You can view and purchase Simon’s art here: https://mfpa.com.au/product-tag/simon-rigg/

State of Mind 57

58

Linear Artists: Vicki West

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74Th58ipROw&feature=emb_title

I am a proud Pakana and Trawlwoolway woman, mother, grandmother, artist from Tebrakunna Country in northeast Tasmania.

I use kelp as a metaphor for survival. Traditionally, it was used to make water carriers, playing an essential role in the lives of the old people of Tasmania, as a part of their everyday toolkit. I have used the jackie vine as a metaphor for unwelcome pests in our own environment, as it’s a native plant but is often considered a pest.

My work is influenced by history and the historical ideology that we don’t exist. That Truganini was the last of our people, supposedly. I dispute this using my arts practice to reiterate that ‘we are still here’.

Vestra is a body of work created for my grandson, shortly

after his birth, and explores the idea of protecting, sharing and maintaining culture, each of the nine pods containing personal and cultural material and knowledge for him to discover.

Milaythina takila is a celebration of the continuance of culture. Exploring notions of resilience and the importance of intergenerational practices for sharing of culture and cultural knowledge.

The 143 woven circles reference the years since the passing of Truganini. Many historical and current-day people believe that the Tasmanian Aboriginal people became extinct upon her death in 1876. The government of the day proclaimed she was the last full-blood Tasmanian Aborigine, hence evolved the prevailing myth of extinction.

Peeling back the physical and psychological layers built up over time allows us to find an indexed truth often hidden by social and political agendas. These works invite the viewer to explore that which is below the surface and that which contributes collectively to the formation of the present day.

Accessed from: https://maas.museum/linear-artists-vicki-west/

State of Mind 59

Untitled 1, 2008 Launceston white flag iris (Diplarrena moraea), bull kelp (Durvillaea potatorum)

Possum basket, 2008 larapuna (Eddystone Point), Launceston white flag iris (Diplarrena moraea), possum skin

teyenebe Vicki West ‘Working with the traditional materials and in the traditional ways has been important for me in reconnecting with the Aboriginal heritage and culture.

Sitting with other women in the Community, and sharing stories while we weave, much in the same way as it has been for thousands of generations is a very grounding experience.’

Vicki West (born 1960) is a Launceston based artist.

Utilising a variety of mediums to create contemporary art works Vicki’s work ranges from small individual forms to large scale, often political, installations. Vicki studied textiles at the University of Tasmania, Launceston graduating with first class Honours BFA in 2001 and MFA in 2008. Vicki has exhibited extensively throughout Australia over the past decade and is represented in numerous public collections.

Water carrier, 2008 Launceston bull kelp (Durvillaea potatorum), red-hot poker (Kniphofia sp.), tea tree (Melaleuca sp.)

Vicki grew up with her maternal (non-Aboriginal) grandmother Constance Milbourne who was a renowned craftswomen, learning many skills including weaving and basketry from an early age. She was first introduced to the tradition of Tasmanian Aboriginal basket weaving through a cultural workshop in the early 1990s.

A strong advocate for sharing of traditional skills and knowledge within the Tasmanian Aboriginal community, Vicki has been an active participant in a broad range of cultural projects, both in the Aboriginal community and more broadly over the past ten years—including her work as a tutor, mentor and artist within the tayenebe project. ©2009 Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery. All rights reserved.

vestra, 2006–08 Launceston bull kelp (Durvillaea potatorum), netting twine, found objects

60

Kooparoona Niara - Mountains of the Spirits Nettie Hulme It is early winter and I am sitting with my favourite comforter around my shoulders, kettle gurgling softly on the wood stove. The cape is made from a very soft mohair yarn woven into a muted lilac & green tartan. I bought this small cape at a garage sale many years ago on a frosty morning in the Otway Ranges, south western Victoria, Australia. The seller told me it had belonged to a friend of hers, a small Scottish woman named Jean, who wore the cape every evening while she played a hand of cards and sipped whiskey. I wonder what Jean would have thought of the view from my bed here in the highlands of Tasmania...

In this ‘land of a thousand lakes’ our shack sits in the lee of Dell’s Bluff, with the Mother Lord Plains behind us and stretched out in front, Yangina, the Great Lake, framed by mountains dusted with early season snow. Would it remind Jean of North Eastern Scotland along with the red deer antlers mounted on the shack wall? Would she

speak with the mountains like her country woman, Nan Shepard, author of the book I am currently reading, ‘The Living Mountain’. By squinting my eyes, I can imagine the purple shadows on the mountains to be heather and I try to visualise the land of my ancestral line. The trailing, swirling ever present mists would have transported the most homesick migrant back to the land of the Picts.

Yangina was formed by the damming of existing small lakes and tributaries to generate hydro-electricity. This created the largest, highest fresh water lake in Australia at over 1,000 meters above sea level. This huge body of water is the perfect habitat for imported brown trout from Scotland. The Rainbow Lodge was built at Doctor’s Point in 1910 but it burned to the ground in the 1940s. I would have been looking right across to it, but instead there are many days when real-time rainbows dance across the water from east to west for hours at a time.

My home here in Breona is in one of the coldest nonalpine locations in Australia. It has an ‘altitude-influenced subpolar oceanic climate’, a classification quite unusual for Australia, only shared with places in other subpolar regions such as Punta Arenas in southern Chile and Reykjavík in Iceland.1

1 T he Edge : a natural history of Tasmania’s Great Western Tiers / Sarah Lloyd ; foreword by Tom May (2012) Pub by Friends of Jackeys Marsh Inc

State of Mind 61

‘Breona’ is Aboriginal for ‘fish’. 2 It is also a Celtic word meaning ‘exalted’ and ‘noble’. A strange coincidence to have the same word, with different meanings, in two ancient cultures separated a world apart.

A sad haunting permeates this harsh landscape. Precious knowledge and wisdom garnered over countless generations of Tasmanian Aboriginal people, for over forty thousand years, has been lost. All the skills essential to survive physically and spiritually in this wild landscape. We are all the poorer for this immeasurable loss and it will take thousands of years to unlock the secrets of this Country once again.

Yet, to wake every morning to this epic landscape, despite the horrific human history, is to be anointed with grace.

It is like being bathed in the elementals of life; water, air, earth and fire. Everything needed to sustain life is to be found here. Stepping outside the door is to enter into a glamourie, a magical land of deep time with limitless possibilities, where all things, from stones and rocks; to trees and the mountains themselves, are animated.

Is someone watching from the hole inside that rotting trunk? The flickering light through the stunted forest casts a shadow play on the river of rocks, tricking the eyes to see all manner of beings. Supernaturals inhabit this land still. And the mountains have seen it all, absorbed it and continue to keep watch. These ‘mountains of spirits’ seem able to hold all the joy and all the sorrow together,

echoing through the ages with a tangible intensity.

To dwell in this Gondwanaland landscape is to be in a constant state of awe and enchantment bringing on a daily welling of gratitude for this life. With these mountains as companions, I am never alone.

The first time I spoke with a mountain was in the Canadian Rockies. I was overwhelmed by the surreal nature of their height and majesty. Being Australian born and not much travelled globally until my fifties – I never fully understood the concept of a ‘mountain’ until I crossed the world.

Travelling along the Columbian Icefield Parkway was very ‘trippy’. The mountains didn’t speak to me in words. They didn’t need to. They just communicated in a mind-meld kind of way: ‘I Am’.

The second time I communed with a mountain she taught me a song. I was boating with friends through a fjord at the water’s edge of a sheer cliff on the wild southern coast of Newfoundland. One of those fathomless fjords that map 540 million old mountains of rocks wherein lie fossils of the first skeletal creatures on this planet. So high was this monolith I was unable to hold my head back far enough to see the summit and my heart felt like it would burst with a joyous rapture. I joined in spontaneous song with this mountain: “I see you now, I breathe you in.” We breathed each other in as the boat passed quietly along the side – as above, so below – our boat being about the middle mark of the mountain.

2 Notes on the History of Central Plateau by G.H. Stancombe (1972) sourced 6/11/2020 from https://eprints.utas.edu.au/14609/

62

Now, here at the bottom of the world, I am reading these words of Nan Shephard’s and know exactly what she is conveying. Something that a decade ago was ineffable to me: ‘So, simply to look on anything, such as a mountain, with the love that penetrates to its essence, is to widen the domain of being in the vastness of non-being.’3 As shrouds of mist close in around the shack, I snuggle further into Jean’s cape. I pour a ‘wee dram’ of whiskey and raise a toast to all the ancestors who have been before and all the descendants yet to come to this snow dusted plateau and dolerite-capped highlands. A toast to all the mountains and their spirits. They have so much to tell if only we have the ears and heart to listen.

Acknowledgements The Palawa people belong to the oldest continuing culture in the world. They cared and protected Country for thousands of years. They knew this land, they lived on the land and they died on these lands. I honour them.

I pay my respects to elders past and present and to the many Aboriginal people that did not make elder status and to the Tasmanian Aboriginal community that continue to care for Country.

I recognise a history of truth which acknowledges the impacts of invasion and colonisation upon Aboriginal people resulting in the forcible removal from their lands.

Our Island is deeply unique, with spectacular landscapes with our cities and towns surrounded by bushland, wilderness, mountain ranges and beaches.

I stand for a future that profoundly respects and acknowledges Aboriginal perspectives, culture, language and history. And a continued effort to fight for Aboriginal justice and rights paving the way for a strong future.4

3 Shepherd, Nan. The Living Mountain . Canongate Books. Kindle Edition.

4 h ttps://www.utas.edu.au/riawunna/welcome-ceremony-protocols Accessed 18 Nov 2020

State of Mind 63

Hold Your Own Kae Tempest

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFyEFTaIJ7A

Perspectives 64

Perspective is the way that people look at a situation.

Perspective taking is the ability to look beyond your own point of view, so that you can consider how someone else may think or feel about something. To do this successfully, you must have some understanding of others’ thoughts, feelings, motivations, and intentions.

“The real voyage of discovery consists, not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.”

“A pair of wings, a different respiratory system, which enabled us to travel through space, would in no way help us, for if we visited Mars or Venus while keeping the same senses, they would clothe everything we could see in the same aspect as the things of the Earth. The only true voyage, the only bath in the Fountain of Youth, would be not to visit strange lands but to possess other eyes, to see the universe through the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to see the hundred universes that each of them sees, that each of them is; and this we do, with great artists; with artists like these we do really fly from star to star.”

Marcel Proust ‘Remembrance of Things Past’

65

“The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be.”

— Douglas Adams The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time

66

Eco “Eco” comes from the Greek word oikos, meaning home. Ecology is the study of home, while economics is the management of home.

Ecologists attempt to define the conditions and principles that govern life’s ability to flourish through time and change. Societies and our constructs, like economics, must adapt to those fundamentals defined by ecology. The challenge today is to put the “eco” back into economics and every aspect of our lives.”

­ David Suzuki, — The Sacred Balance: Rediscovering Our Place in Nature

Perspectives 67

Seeing with new eyes Chris Johnstone gives a taste of what it is like to look at the world through the filter of Active Hope.

At last year’s UN climate talks in Warsaw, delegates were moved to tears by the speech of Naderev Saño of the Philippines. Only a few days earlier his home city of Tacloban had been devastated by one of the largest cyclones ever recorded on land. Describing the link between climate change and the intensity of tropical storms, he called for an emergency drive to stabilise greenhouse gases. Two weeks of wrangling later, the word ‘commitment’ was dropped from key sections of the meeting’s final agreement because it was seen as too strong a term.

What do we do when we feel the sense of emergency expressed by people like Saño, yet see progress blocked at every step? When facing deeply-entrenched resistance to any breakthrough, it is easy to lose hope. Jane, one of the people I interviewed as part of my research on psychological responses to global issues, cared deeply about the world and was horrified by what she saw happening. But she regarded humans as a lost cause so stuck in our ways that she believed the devastation of our world was inevitable. “What’s the point in doing anything,” she exclaimed, “if it won’t change what we’re heading for?”

The word ‘hope’ has two meanings. The first involves hopefulness, where our preferred outcome seems reasonably likely. If we require this kind of hope before we commit to an action, our response gets blocked in areas where we don’t rate our chances too highly. That’s what happened for Jane, who felt so hopeless that she didn’t see the point of even trying.

The second meaning of hope is about desire. When Jane was asked what she’d like to happen in our world, without hesitation she described the future she hoped for, the kind of world she longed for so much it hurt. This kind of hope, where we know what we’d like or love to take place, can start us on a journey. But it is what we do with this hope that really makes the difference. Passive hope involves waiting for external agencies to create the future we desire. Active Hope is about becoming active participants in the story of bringing about what we hope for.

Active Hope is a practice. Like t’ai chi and gardening, it is something we do rather than have. It is a process we can apply to any situation, and it involves three key steps. First, we take in a clear view of reality; second, we identify what we hope for, in terms of the direction we’d like things to move in or values we’d like to see expressed; and third, we take steps to move ourselves or our situation in that direction.

Since Active Hope doesn’t require our optimism, we can apply it even in areas where we feel hopeless. The guiding impetus is intention. We choose what we want to bring about, act for or express. Rather than weighing up our chances and only proceeding if we feel hopeful, we focus on our intention and let that be our guide.

Active Hope is both a flow we can open to and a story that can happen through us. When we’re in the flow of this story, it enriches our sense of meaning and purpose in a way that can make our lives more satisfying. But how can we open up this flow and make it grow stronger?

Just as gardening and t’ai chi are practices we can learn and get better at, so too can we train ourselves in Active Hope. One approach to such training is the Work That Reconnects, a system of transformational practices and insights developed by Joanna Macy and colleagues. It involves a strengthening journey round a spiral of four stages. This journey is often undertaken in experiential workshops lasting a weekend or more. We can also apply a briefer version as a practice by ourselves or with friends.

Here is a short form that might only take 10 minutes: The first port of call is Gratitude. See what words naturally follow a sentence that begins “For supporting me to live, I give thanks to…” If you are with a friend or a group, you might take it in turns with a couple of minutes each. If you are by yourself, you can fill a page in a notebook or speak out your thanksgiving. When we experience gratitude, we tend to feel more like giving back. This is a great way of mobilising motivation to act for our world.

The second step is to Honour our Pain for the World.

Pain can act as an activating impulse, a wake-up call that alerts us to danger. An open sentence we can use here is “Looking at the future we’re heading into, concerns I have include…” Give yourself a couple of minutes, or, if writing, see if you can fill a page.

Motivated both by appreciation and alarm, the next stage of our journey involves opening to perspectives that help resource our response. We call this stage Seeing with New Eyes. For this, see what words follow a sentence that begins “Something that inspires me is…”

As we move round the spiral, the momentum builds and energises the final stage, Going Forth. This focuses attention on practical steps we can take. See what words follow “Something I’d love to do to make a difference is…”

After giving yourself a couple of minutes on this, you can nudge your intention forward with a sentence that begins “A step towards this I will make in the next seven days is…”

One of the biggest factors influencing human behaviour is what we see others do. When people see us taking steps, they’re more likely to take them too. We can open up the flow of hope by inviting it to happen through us. It is a choice, it is our vote, and we can cast it every day.

Chris Johnstone is co-author, with Joanna Macy, of Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We’re in Without Going Crazy (New World Publishers). www.chrisjohnstone.info

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Andrew

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Portraits of a Pandemic

by Anjella Roessler As an artist I work combining the genres of photography and history, exploring ways of presenting research to create an emotional recognition and response to historical events.

I am currently working on a project around the Covid-19 pandemic, researching on and tying it in with the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1919 as it affected Australia. Very little has been written on the Australian experience of the 1919 wave, but what is found in archives is very similar to that which we are experiencing currently, in both government response or lack of, as well as public perceptions and understandings. My intention, eventually, is to research and present these comparisons extensively, and to seek to understand and give a human face to these times of trauma.

The photographic part of this is portraits of presentday people in their masks. I ask my sitters to bring their favourite mask to the session. To create an experience of being out of time, I use a camera similar to that which was in use in photographic studios in 1919. This large, cumbersome camera creates images that are 8”x10” in size. The lens is from the early 1900s and would have been in use at the time of the early pandemic. This old glass also adds to the way my images look, without the sharp, clinical results of more modern lenses. Rather than film, I use darkroom paper to replicate the early photographic processes. Exposures are quite long, my sitters are required to hold their pose without blinking or moving for sometimes several seconds. Using this technique, the portraits contain life. Any small breath records, and the images have a beautiful softness and pictorial element.

This creates an appearance of an old, found image, yet with the jarring addition of the sitters’ modern masks.

Lynne

The images once shot are developed in the darkroom, in trays under a red light, as they would have been at the time. The entire process is very hands on. Most of my practice involves tangibility and time. Nothing is fast in creating these. The resulting images are always a serendipitous surprise. Some images are heavy with texture, others are quite clean and bright. Light affects the paper in differing ways, colours and tones do not always register as they would with normal black and white. Blues register as white, reds as black for example. I love the element of surprise and unknowingness.

The sessions are all very covid-safe and social-distancing aware. For some time, I could only photograph using family, but now that rules are a little more relaxed, I am able to include other people. They are all done outside,

Nathan

70 Portraits of a Pandemic

with a canvas set up behind the sitter and using the sun as my light source. The subject is 1.5m away from me, with the camera between us, echoing and acting as a reminder of the current social distancing rules.

Eventually, I hope to see the finished project as an exhibition (one day when galleries are open again!). My aim is to have as many portraits as possible, and to have them blown up very large and hung all over the space.

To me, they speak of our connection and responsibility to one another, as well as the echoes to the past and our resilience in times of trauma. The masks draw attention to the eyes, wherein you can see each person’s response to the pandemic. Stress, exhaustion, strength of will, hope all are present and clear to be read.

Rebecca

Tracey

Sascha

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She Just Is Sheridan Campbell “See this one time I wandered out into the air

You love.

And I found it there

I remind myself after a long, cold and deeply confronting winter in lockdown, that spring is here and that even if I feel like I’m spinning in circles with myself (excuse the pun) I remind myself that the seeds of growth are always sprouting inside me, that everything that falls and dies is a womb for the new. That when it comes down to it, it’s all a matter of perspective.

My spirit there” Here’s my first hoop flow in what feels like a lifetime.

I don’t pick my hoop up much these days, but yesterday the sun sunk into my skin and melted the cold, dark parts inside me, and the wind carried the sweet scent of blooming flowers with it as it danced loudly enough through the trees to mute out any story that would get in the way of me and this moment. It only lasted a few minutes, and for once in my mind, that was enough. A personal victory. A reminder that she is still inside me, this pure child who is not interested in psychological evaluations or political perspectives or spiritual evolution, who is not caught up in the stories of how I have been or how I should be or what is and isn’t.

She just is.

Playful, because it is our nature to play.

Flowing, because it is our nature to flow.

Being, because it is our nature to be.

And whether or not realising, she is always growing.

And there will only be so much time to play. So play! It is playing and rejoicing and making fun of life that you love.

That you love.

https://youtu.be/UCJvYuaH-OU

Surrender to the unfolding, even if it’s for a moment, the deep inhale of the sweet scent of a flower, the feeling of warm sunshine on your skin. Marinade in these small, simple moments as best you can. These moments mean more than most of our egos would ever let us believe.

These moments are our reference points to what is true when we get lost, that we are nature, that we are sensory beings, that we are not defined by the stories in our minds or the chemical responses in our bodies that encourage us to pull the covers over when the sun is out, begging to shine its healing light onto us.

Song: Prophecy of the Morning Dew Artist: Clear Mortifee

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Another word for ‘politically correct’

by Renée Otmar

Remember New Year’s Eve, 1999?

Readers who are old enough to recall how they celebrated the turning of the century may also recall a quietly underlying sense of panic as we watched our clocks ticking closer to midnight.

The millennium bug, or Y2K, as we called it, was a 1960s-era computer programming shortcut whose chickens were about to come home to roost. There were dire warnings about what would occur around the world when computer programs using two-digit years (98, 99 instead of 1998, 1999) could not distinguish between the years 2000 and 1900. Some commentators warned about impending mass plane crashes, while others predicted malfunctioning power stations that would plunge civilisation as we knew it back into the Stone Age. In the United Kingdom, incorrect assessments for Down Syndrome were sent to 154 pregnant women, resulting in two abortions due to miscalculation of the mothers’ age.

These were perhaps the most serious consequences at the individual level. Other documented problems were relatively minor – for example, taxi meters in Singapore stopped working and the machines validating bus tickets failed in two Australian states. But, for the most part, the sky did not fall in.

Twenty years later, and our reliance on electronic and computing technologies has increased in ways we could not have anticipated back then. Australians typically own several ‘smart’ devices, including phones, tablets, laptop and desktop computers, wearable devices, cars and

household appliances, to name just a few. We depend on these devices in emergency situations and to conduct our work and pay our bills; for entertainment and to communicate with each other across a range of platforms.

Chief among the latter is social media.

Interestingly, while many people extoll the virtues of social media – it helps us keep in touch easily with friends and family, locally and in far-flung places; it can provide opportunities to find love or companionship, and so on – but perhaps as many people are concerned about its dangers. Among these is cyber bullying, which in a nutshell is vile, anti-social behaviour conducted online.

Many people use social media to express their creativity, or to share their views or support a particular issue, including social and political causes. It’s almost impossible to comprehend the sheer range of topics and grievances people find necessary to air on online, but one that stands out for me is ‘political correctness’.

Now, political correctness is not a new concept by any means. In fact, it dates back to 1934, when The New York Times revealed that Nazi Germany was only approving applications for reporting permits from ‘pure “Aryans” whose opinions are ‘politically correct’. In other words, even international journalists had to respect and support that regime’s doctrines. Criticise Hitler or the party and you would lose your permit – or worse.

In Australia, conservative politicians and commentors, as well as many with extremist leanings, often complain about ‘political correctness gone mad’. They object to changes in the way we address and depict people so that these reflect contemporary norms, such as referring to people by their nominated cultural, gender or other identity.

In my work as an editor, I am often asked to assess the suitability of a manuscript for its intended audience. If the book is for young children, part of my job is to ensure that the words, sentences, images and concepts are not too complicated for them to comprehend while at the

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same time encouraging an expansion in their vocabulary and knowledge. If the book is a novel for adults and set in contemporary times, one of the things I need to look out for is anachronisms – for example, words, objects, customs and dialogue from a different era that don’t match our time. A novel describing a Melbourne teenager in the 1970s using a mobile phone is anachronistic because mobile phones only came into use in Australia in the 1990s.

Aspects of this work is known as ‘sensitivity reading’, which means I need to assess whether the manuscript is in good taste and matches contemporary norms and expectations in Australian society. If a book that is offensive to certain readers has to be pulled off the market and pulped, it can spell disaster for the publisher, which usually invests considerable sums in anticipation of sales. That’s the financial consideration.

However, considerations of taste and respect are, generally speaking, held in much higher regard by Australian audiences. Our values of justice and ‘a fair go’ apply to everyone, from every walk of life. It is no longer acceptable in Australia to discriminate against anyone because of their sex, sexuality and/or gender identity. We believe that a child growing up in a poor household should have as much opportunity as one raised in a wealthy household.

There are many other examples of Australia’s changed – and changing – cultural norms.

Ultimately, these norms are based on two fundamental values: human rights and respect for the individual.

And that is what ‘political correctness’ is really all about.

Unfortunately, the term is used as an insult these days.

Some may consider being polite and having good manners to be too old-fashioned. So perhaps we could stick with the one basic idea: respect. Which is something everyone deserves.

Renée Otmar’s most recent work, Editing for Sensitivity, Diversity and Inclusion: A guide for professional editors was published in October 2020 in paperback and ebook formats.

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Book Review Melissa Lindeman Malcolm A story in verse

by Leni Shilton UWA Publishing 2019 Crawley, Western Australia

I had planned to take my time reading Leni Shilton’s second verse novel Malcolm. Her first, Walking with Camels1 I had savoured, not just because of the subject matter - the extraordinary life of Bertha Strehlow, and her travels in Central Australia in the 1930s and 40s - as much as the prose and imagery it evoked. I admit I wasn’t particularly looking forward to reading Malcolm, described as a “dark verse novel”, “set in Melbourne’s’ underbelly” about a young, homeless drug user. I had imagined perhaps reading a poem or two each night and taking my time. This was not to be and I read it in one sitting, unable to focus on anything other than his grinding world.

If you didn’t know anything about the author, you would be excused from thinking the book is part autobiographical, such is the depth with which Shilton draws her characters. It is a verse novel drawn from the author’s experiences of working with men in prisons, and from working as a nurse in city hospitals. We are led into the world of Malcolm and the squat he shares in inner Melbourne, learning something about his family, others in his life, and how he sees himself.

There are so many of us now, we make the city ugly.

I know when it happens, when I become ugly, because eyes slip over me and I am invisible. 2

Life on the streets is presented to us in such an understated way it is impossible to be simply a spectator casting judgement. There’s a sense that we know Malcolm, and others like him, albeit differently. Melbourne too is a familiar character, but presented gently in a different light.

The city yawns like a sleepy cat.

At this hour, lights glow yellow and hazy On empty streets. 3 Shilton says in the author’s note that her work in the prison system, where she spent “years of listening”, is “the background, not the source of the story”. The complexity of the world she has created, and the lives within it, left me feeling that these characters had been quietly living within her for a long time, eventually demanding to be released so they could communicate directly with us. Although Malcolm’s life has tragedy and he and his friends are often unsafe, ultimately it is a hopeful book. Compassion can do that, and the verse novel is an ideal medium for this. You do not have to be a regular poetry reader to appreciate this novel. The poems are beautifully simple and convey both narrative and emotion with ease. The characters are believable, their stories can be understood.

Walking with Camels – The Story of Bertha Strehlow.

2018, UWA Publishing.

1

If you’d like to learn more about Walking with Camels, there’s an excellent ABC radio interview on Sunday Extra with Hugh Riminton: https://www.abc.net. au/radionational/programs/sundayextra/the-newira/11043016 2

From “Ugly is the new black”, p.109

3

From the opening poem “Trams”, p.10

Perspectives 75

Grassroots to Selfies-Paradise

by April-Kaye Ikinci

In 2009, in a grungy corner of Melbourne, 2 street cultures lived side-by-side.

The homeless/the Street People and others at risk and the graffiti artists and taggers. Both lots ever changing.

On the connecting uneven, narrow, old blue-stone lanes, canyoned by industrial C19th and C20th brick or concrete three-storey buildings, they passed each other and went about their business.

One lot to THE LIVING ROOM, a Primary Health Care access point for food and drink; access to nurses and doctor; emergency help or information or advice; use of showers, washing and drying machines; shelter, seating and company during the day; computer time and other facilities that make life better living or at least livable. Part of the landmark visibility were those not at ease with inside spaces or wanting to smoke, sat outside in the lane, on upturned colourful milk crates and watched the street scene. Some commented loudly positively or negatively on what they saw.

The other lot, mainly young, male, with their spray cans of paint in backpacks and eyes at attention to pinpoint a wall space to suit their own next actions of image-making on the walls. These walls already decorated, nay embellished, were asymmetrical patchworkstyle with wondrous, weird, clever, sly-funny, challenging and left-field markings, tagging, pictures, motifs, paper-prints and stencils done by others before; probably in the silence of the late late inner-city night.

The SprayPainters noticed what was done, and appreciated the range from the individual artist making her/his social commentary to the skilled StreetArtist who decorated the small restaurant’s outside wall with verve and pattern-making to keep the profile of the business visible. And to discourage constant new “painting” with its paint fumes that seeped into the eatery. They showed respect of others by not intruding on or over-painting their work, and even sometimes recognised their street names.

April-Kaye Ikinci © 2017 Halleluiah

76 Grassroots to Selfies-Paradise

April-Kaye Ikinci © 2017 Elle-Elder

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They made their marks in spaces newly discovered on the wall, in niches or gaps or weather-degraded paper images and when space became a premium, ventured deeper into the hidden back lanes to spray their desired presentation, often standing on stacked emptied milk crates that had held their cans.

And I met young ones there, from Western Australia and elsewhere who said that they knew Melbourne as the Graffiti and Street Art Capital.

The LIVING ROOM Mob at Xmas (and at other times when numbers and interest was up), played informal cricket in the lane, had a barbecue and had a Pinata-bashing session releasing lots of socks to gratified receivers and cheererons. I was Art Therapy Staff for a season and assisted people to set up Piñata-making sessions and individual and group art events and decorations. I noticed the street scene too.

As the holidays approached, the SprayPainters got younger and younger, more clumps appeared and seemed to come from further away in the suburbs and took less care about others’ images. Sometimes the lanes were full of fumes and teenage boys on milk crates.

The smokers had mixed feelings and some found other places to be.

And the word had also spread to those who came to view and rejoice in this perceived-as-rebel or taking-one’spublic-space phenomena. Cameras and fans and even arttourists from camera clubs and art courses started to visit.

Recently I revisited with winter clothes for their emergency stores.

The lane was very crowded. Once I could safely notice my route up the lane, I noticed other things: that most of the sub-culture stuff was gone. Grand accomplished expensive-amount-of paint realist huge portraits and images had overtaken the walls. Tags had overtaken the restaurant patterning. There was still some good stuff but it felt self-conscious. And the tourists were now Overseas Far East people, and Other Australian States visitors, International students and Outer Suburban families on a Day-in-Town, many posing in front of these images for Selfies or Tour photos. It was now on some map.

A huge door had been opened in one of the old industrial walls of the lane, and a super hip, American-style young person’s upmarket MALL of sharp, modern clothes, of fashion slick sporty shoes etc with black & white and silver trims, brand labels and led-light strips, that exuded wealth, youth and jive. Opposite the smokers’ corner.

And today of all days that I might visit there, the Emporium had a Street Party, with a smoking fire in a cauldron in the middle of the lane. With a security guard who was obviously a new migrant wide-eyed and not sure of what he is seeing, and unclear if this behavior is normal and accepted in Australia. Also with a film crew and a couple of publicity-savvy StreetArtists at the ready.

Two cultures plus and minus.

My favourite graffiti got painted over.

**************************************

I left around that time and went onto other things.

April-Kaye Ikinci©2019

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The Community that Connects Together Survives Together

by Lisa Jarvis

“You might have to cancel the festival, have you heard about the virus?”

These words were spoken to me in mid-February and my reaction was kind of a puzzled look at the questioner - our annual festival is the major community celebration and solid manifestation of who we are as a community and what matters to us. Some virus seemed of little relevance on this bright morning in the Marsh.

Many of our community members had participated in the months leading up to lockdown in our Deans Marsh and District Community Plan consultation, MADCAP. The basis of MADCAP was conversation. Having these conversations within a framework of asset based community development meant we were looking at our strengths. It is no surprise that a key strength and priority was our local community and community connections.

First lockdown rocked our world and what sense of normal we had embraced. What did our community need from us to assist them to navigate these times? This emergency was different - community gathers together in crisis so what do you do when you can’t physically gather and you can’t give someone a hug of reassurance?

Local food security and providing options for people to gain the essentials without travelling was a first step.

Inspired by the work of other local community houses, we established our Little Free Pantry and our local Grow Make Gather group established our Grow Free Cart, local business Gentle Annie Berry Gardens partnered with us to hold a series of distanced community feasts and our local community noticeboard was alive with offers of assistance.

These initiatives provided a connection point for people.

Meals were collected for elders, gardens harvested to share, and touchstones created.

Phone calls often get lost in the fast world of text messaging and emails, but the phone call has been one of the greatest tools in letting people know we are not far away and equates in this time to a chinwag over the fence or a tap on the shoulder.

Our Community Pen Pal initiative involving local kids and elders is a very special illustration of the importance of intergenerational connection. The utter delight of receiving a letter and responding has been evident with

Perspectives 79

young and elder Pen Pals and special visits to collect letters from the Community Pen Pal letterbox. One young Pen Pal loves to dress up for the special walk to collect her correspondence.

locals creating two carved timber community lounges for our community gathering space. The best present ever and a symbol of the importance of community connection and creating spaces for that to happen.

A really human need is to share our experiences. The ISO Community Photographic Collage invited community members to share their experiences of isolation by contributing a photo to our online collage - the result demonstrates the heart, soul and resilience of our community.

One of the guiding principles that was articulated from the MADCAP process is that we are a caring and connected community who celebrate and share our unique community spirit.

Many of us celebrated milestone birthdays during the time of the pandemic - my gift was the community funding and

We sure are and we sure do! As we emerge from this time, I am looking forward to continuing the myriad of conversations and actions that keep us connected.

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Self portrait 2020

Declan Armstrong When did you start on your art journey and what/who have been your inspiration?

I realised that art was part of my journey about six months ago. Prior to that I had done a handful of pieces, although I always stuck to practical projects that involved the carpentry skills I was already comfortable with. My main source of inspiration has been a combination of religious symbolism, the vivid visual imagery I find in rap music, psychedelics, personal experiences and dreams. The love, support and critique I’ve received from family and friends has also had a big impact.

Your drawings have a surrealist quality, what is the story behind the images?

I approach art with the belief that the image precedes the story. When I’ve done my more surrealist pieces I try to let the lines and shapes reveal themself to me as I work. When I’m finished, I try to be very flexible in my interpretation of the symbols, for example a syringe might have a different symbolic meaning from person to person

Freedom

and from moment to moment. I hope that if people can take this approach when viewing art, they are able to see they own story in a new light.

It is difficult to get both inspiration and technique happening at the same time - what tips do you have for other beginning young artists?

Give yourself room to be creative. We live in a world full of surprises that can become scary. That’s fantastic. Fear, stress, anxiety and depression live inside a box with a pretty ribbon. That we unwrap them is inevitable, and when you realize it is a gift and not a trick your life can become much more bearable. Inside you’ll find your judge reflected in the self that is courageously fulfilling its destiny. Your truth now is revealed in that image; forever question its relationship to reality.

What are your hopes for the future?

I’m excited to see what direction my art takes and I will follow it with as much support as I can muster. Along that path I would love to sell some pieces and maybe teach some classes, but I’ve never been one to stick to a plan so I’ll just see how it unfolds.

Where can people view more of your art?

You can see it all on my Instagram @decspective Feel free to ask me any questions if something interests you!

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Sleep

The Turning

The Forgotten King

82

Perspectives 83

Erin Downie As we look deep into nature, patterns emerge that can be found all throughout the natural world in different forms and in every facet of life. From the lines on a seashell, to the intricate detail on a dragonflies wing. We find life imitates art and art imitates life. These pieces were inspired by these patterns over time spent collecting shells, seed pods and fungi. Examining the patterns under a microscope creates endless inspiration for art. In these works I have used ink and watercolour to capture the vibrant colours found in insects, plants and sea life.

Ink and Watercolour.

Erin Downie Artworks ©2020

If you would like to purchase a work, please email rebelliousbirdmusic@gmail.com Or phone 0401542969

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Meet A Local: John Bartlett, Poet/Gardener

by Renée Otmar The SurfCoast/Otways region is the natural home of artists and artisans alike, from musicians, painters and sculptors to wood crafters, winemakers and world-class chefs.

One of the region’s best-kept secrets is a vibrant literary community of writers and poets.

fiction pieces that were later published in my first book, A Tiny and Brilliant Light. And one thing led to another as I gained confidence. I also completed an undergraduate degree and a Master of Arts at Deakin University, then tutored writing students there for a number of years.

I spoke with John Bartlett about finding solitude and inspiration in our spectacular natural environment.

What about your poetry?

Tell us a little about yourself – what do you do? Do you have a job title?

I’ve had many job titles throughout my life, from Catholic priest and kitchen hand to writing tutor and film extra, but now, being semi-retired, the label I’m comfortable with is: ‘Poet/Gardener’. I’d be happy with that on my tombstone.

You are so modest! I know you as a writer, poet, radio host, interviewer and tutor.

Are you still doing those things?

Not so much now that I am focusing on my poetry (and the garden). Still tutoring a bit. I did do a couple of public interviews for the Geelong Word for Word National Non-Fiction Festival late last year.

I had always felt that poetry was too difficult. I couldn’t get my head around it. But about 5 years ago I did a poetry writing course with Writers Victoria in Melbourne, and that got me started.

What are the best things about being a writer and poet?

I’ve always worked best being semi-independent and working autonomously. As a freelance writer that’s the perfect situation, working in a casual, undisciplined way – unless of course there are deadlines. I work in fits and starts but being creative means I never really switch off. I’m always thinking about It feels like this is what the most appropriate word or how to I am meant to do. Words move forward in a piece of writing.

Some of my best writing comes from have always been my walking on the beach.

passion …

I’ve read somewhere that all the world’s greatest thinkers do poetry – by writing or reading it. Do you think of yourself in that way?

I guess I’m an accidental thinker, not setting out to have lofty thoughts but curious about life, about people’s behaviour and always fascinated by the world and people.

How did you get started?

In 2000, I decided the one thing I’d always wanted to do was to write, and so I enrolled in the Professional Writing & Editing Diploma at the Gordon Institute in Geelong. I started to be published while still a student – with articles in the Age, the Australian, the Canberra Times; all non-

Are there any down sides?

The principal down side is never being paid according to the number of hours you work. There’s no money in this sort of work. Also, it can be a bit lonely working in isolation without having colleagues to interact with.

So, why do it?

I can’t help it – the satisfaction in the process, I guess.

It feels like this is what I am meant to do. Words have always been my passion … how they fit together, the connections, the funny things about language. And poetry brings it all together.

The same with gardening – if I didn’t have a garden I would feel anxious.

I hear you’re celebrating?

Yes, I was recently awarded the Ada Cambridge Poetry Prize. That was a lovely surprise and, even better, a friend of mine, another Geelong poet, was also shortlisted.

What are your current projects?

My eighth book, Awake at 3am, a full collection of my poetry, will soon be published by Ginninderra Press.

In the background I’m writing new poetry, too. I’ve

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also recently started a poetry podcast on my website, Beyond the Estuary; weekly at the moment, and I hope to continue these.

And there is always something on the go in the garden.

It’s a garden in the sand dunes, by the sea, and it’s finally coming together, after more than twenty years of trying – unsuccessfully – to control it. I think I am finally coming to terms with it. One part is quite overgrown, so the current project is to tackle that.

Are you involved in the local community in any way?

I’m just coming to the end of a two-year stint as President of SurfCoast U3A (University of the Third Age), based in Torquay. I’ve been convening a writing group with U3A for about six years and hope to continue. I’m also a member of Surf Coast Rural Australians for Refugees. And I’ve just finished five years on the advisory committee for the Geelong Word for Word National Non-Fiction Festival, which is held each November.

How long have you lived on the Surf Coast?

Just twenty-four years.

What drew you to this place?

Like my partner, I’ve always felt a spiritual connection to the sea, ever since childhood holidays at Port Elliott in South Australia, and Breamlea is the perfect location: small, quiet and cut off from rampant development.

What’s it like living on a sand dune?

Apart from being exposed to the roaring, semi-permanent south-west winds, you feel very close to nature, waterbirds … and the beach is about a two-minute walk. Watching the swans, pelicans, ducks, cormorants, egrets and herons is a bit like spying on the neighbours.

Does living at Breamlea feature in your work?

Yes, I can’t help but be affected by living so close to nature without many of the distractions of modern living. You can’t live here without eyes wide open to the seasons, to the sea, the tides, the birds. I think all my work has been affected by this presence.

What are your favourite local haunts?

In summer particularly, I love walking through the sand dunes behind the beach, and it’s as if the land has been untouched by human influence. There are middens, occasional echidnas crossing your path and often a mob of kangaroos nearby. And always just the sound of birds and the sea.

On the other side, I love haunting the local coffee shops and catching up with people I know or recognise by face if not by name. My favourite café is Mejavos in Torquay – the coffee is good and the people are really friendly.

I do like the isolation, but I need the connection with people, too.

Do you have a favourite local author or poet?

There are so many! Mike Smith, who writes young adult fiction; Miranda Luby writes short stories and non-fiction; Favel Parrett, whose prose reads like poetry. Then there are the local poets: Maria Takolander, Bernard Ryan, Jo Langdon, Rosemary Blake…

John Bartlett’s new collection of poetry, Awake at 3am, is due to published in November 2020.

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Perspectives 87

Phil Weymouth After nearly 20 years of working as a photographer in the Kingdom of Bahrain, it was time to come home. A small island nation in the Persian Gulf of the coast to Saudi Arabia had been the base for my freelance business that saw my work take me to countries like Afghanistan, Oman, Kuwait, UAE, and Iran.

The green of the Otways nearly hurt my eyes after years in the desert and the abundance of wildlife along with crisp clean light was a whole new photographic world for me.

Over the past six months exploring the Otways (when COVID 19 restriction allow) including early morning walks, stunning sunsets, and dawns. With one of the world’s most pristine parks on my doorstep, I have only managed to glimpse what the Otways has to offer.

Setting up my new freelance business in February 2020 was probably not the best timing. One day things will return to normal and I can travel again and spend more time exploring the Otways.

Phil Weymouth M: 0456 675 674 A: Victoria, Australia Email: philweymouth@me.com Web: www.philweymouthphotography.com.au Blog: philweymouth.wordpress.com

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Perspectives 89

Irma Steve Croft Still at work, I ignored the devastation of Caribbean islandsuntil doom was an overlay on Florida, storm turning northto unzip the state. Sent home to evacuate, I cover windows with tin stacked from last year, go inside to tune the radio to a local station, start watching the TV’s logjam of traffic heading north, airports with faces desperate for flights out closing, honeymooners interviewed as Disney World announces shutdown. In the night my power flickers, finally goes.

All day the wind builds, radio warns of storm surge over and over, over and over its dial-up screech of emergency alert.

All day bands of wind and rain swing into my house, longer, stronger, rhopalic, band after band, hour after hour, until it’s slammed by ghost locomotives. I get up, walk the house for damage again and again -- twigs, limbs, a Hotchkiss gunfire against tin, knock against the clapboard house as wind unravels the yard’s woods. As night comes on I know my twenty-eight virgin pines are waving their huge arms at the sky under a Tesla ball of lightning strikes.

Worn out, thoughts eschatological: “Where are the morning birds tonight?”“If the ocean comes, will my gopher tortoises drown in their burrows?” Sleep finally wins out in the worst of it -- I think, “Maybe I wanted this: let death any second come to me here, but, if not, I will rise tomorrow like a first explorer.”

I wake to no apocalypse, ancient pine roots held except for one tree. Heating ravioli on my grandparents’ stone patio grill, the hot tomato smell amazing like the day’s sun and the song of the birds, I see beyond the giant yard clutter one of my pines pushed onto a neighbor’s small oak, over the road, its hundred-foot height now an arch giving greatness to the minor street. Later, threading my bicycle through fallen trees in the quarter-mile avenue to the inlet, past diesel smells of staged crews working to clear roads, I ride up to a first-floor Atlantis of million-dollar homes, the sea pushed over the rocks, trapped inland in a new lake of houses. My neighborhood waits days for the miracle of electricity while I see a new world of poems.

Steven Croft lives on a barrier island off the coast of Georgia, USA, on a property lush with vegetation.

His poems have appeared in Willawaw Journal, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Quaci Press Magazine, Dream Noir, and other places.

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In the Ground of Our Unknowing Writer by David Abram Illustration by Lina Müller and Luca Schenardi

Facing the paradoxes and ambiguities enmeshed with the COVID-19 pandemic, David Abram finds beauty in the midst of shuddering terror. As we’re isolated in this uncertain time, he writes, we can turn to the more-than-human world to empower our empathy for each other.

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to the effluent-clogged canals of Venice may not be true—mostly, it seems, the usual murkiness of the canals is clearing due to the circumstance that ceaseless boat traffic is not churning up those waterways, and so it’s become possible, for the first time in ages, to glimpse schools of fish who’ve always been there swimming through the suddenly pellucid waters. But if we can see those fish in the long quiet of these days, then those finned beings can also see us, can see the sun and the gleaming moon in ways they’ve not been able to for decades. Gray Whales and Humpbacks in the Pacific Northwest can suddenly hear one another’s hundred-mile songs and calls echoing through the depths, uninterrupted by the incessant mechanical whine of boat engines—since the whale-watching tours that hound them have stopped indefinitely, as have the growling propellers of cruise ships and the whirring of most pleasure boats (an underwater cacophony that’s been steadily intensifying over the years, monopolizing the exquisite auditory conductance of the aquatic realm, and confounding all those who communicate in buzzing blips and pings and singsong descants through the fluid medium).

R ight now, the earthly community of life—the more-thanhuman collective—is getting a chance to catch its breath without the weight of our incessant industry on its chest.

The terrifying nightmare barreling through human society in these weeks has forced the gears of the megamachine (all the complex churning of commerce, all this steadily speeding up “progress”) to grind to a halt—and so, as you’ve likely noticed, the land itself is stirring and starting to stretch its limbs, long-forgotten sensory organs beginning to sip the air and sample the water, grasses and needles drinking in sky without the intermediating sting of a chemical haze. The reports of abundant fish returning

Just as, in multiple cities, the profusion of birdsong is becoming evident, no longer hidden by ringtones, honking horns, piercing car alarms, and people yelling into their phones (by all the giddy roiling thrum of business as usual). And right now, late at night, a child is stepping outside her home in the suburbs of Shanghai—as another child is doing in Mumbai, and another in Madrid just before dawn. The child in Shanghai is walking the family dog with her father. The girl stretches her cramped limbs, leaning her head back—whereupon she notices something surpassingly strange. Her eyes widen in wonder: a glimmering river of light is coursing above the silhouetted buildings!Numberless points of light (she knows they are stars) gleam and wink at her along the margins of the overhead river, while near the central current those lights seem to fold into a churning froth of bright cloud. “What is that?” she asks her father. He follows her gaze upward.

“Oh,” he says, “that’s the Silver River.…” In Mumbai, the boy’s grandmother says, “Oh c’mon, you know that: that’s the Ganges of the Aether.”

In Madrid, the father looks up, and then replies to his son: “That’s the Milky Way. Don’t you remember learning about it?” “Yeah…,” the boy answers. “I just didn’t know that you could actually see it.” The father looks back up, then removes his glasses. They both stare and stare.

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LUMINOUS BEAUTY IN the midst of shuddering terror.

Interpersonal solidarity—layer upon tearful layer of empathy for one another—in the midst of enforced solitude and loneliness. The paradoxical, ambiguous nature of this moment is so confounding, so bewildering!

I mean, how excellent that our arrogant species receives this collective slap-in-the-face reality check, waking us two-leggeds up to the simple truth that we are not at all in control, have never really been in control, that we live at the behest of powers—of a complex interplay of powers— far beyond our ability to fully fathom, to predict, or to steer. What hubris to have imagined we could do whatever we want with this exquisitely interwoven wonder of a world!And yet how awful that this lesson must come at the expense of so many unsuspecting human lives, so many innocent souls now shivering with fever and fright as they struggle to draw breath.

with someone providing those skills free of charge. In fact, by the time of this writing (in late March 2020) analogous place-based mutual aid initiatives are sprouting up in localities pretty much everywhere around the world—wild harvesting needed herbs, providing childcare for doctors, delivering food and pharmaceuticals and equipment, offering skilled counseling (by phone) for folks freaking out, setting up sanitation systems in rural areas with scant water, handcrafting masks and protective gear.

What a wonder! Yet at this same moment, the very same catastrophe that’s teaching us to bring our attention back to the local and nearby, forces us to take distance from every person in our vicinity, and to connect only via the most mediated and disembodied of ways, speaking only via the phone and the computer, exchanging information via FaceTime and Zoom and Twitter.

We’re finally being Even a neo-Luddite like me has to admit that the online and internet Here’s another ambiguity. We’re forced to recognize that world has become a huge boon and finally being forced to recognize no top-down institution, blessing in this tenuous time! less that no top-down institution, efficient world of flesh-and-blood governmental or otherwise, governmental or otherwise, interactions?” In The New York Times, can fully ensure our safety. That can fully ensure one columnist suggested that once our deepest insurance against we’ve learned how to conduct most disaster is going local—by getting our safety college courses over the internet, to know our actual neighbors and why would we ever want to go back checking in on one another when we to sitting and lecturing in classrooms? can, participating in our local community Meanwhile, my son in tenth grade is jumping and apprenticing with the more-than-human out of his skin with boredom at the doldrum dullness terrain that surrounds and sustains us. Eating more of of screen-imprisoned classes, and my daughter—abruptly what grows locally, and learning to grow some of these forced home from her blissful freshman year at college—is foods ourselves, reduces the long supply chains that despairing at the drab inanity of college seminars without bring not just foods and products from far-flung places the delicious bustle of seeing, hearing, and especially into our lives, but also pathogens that would otherwise feeling her classmates as they reflectively tussle with be way more limited in their circulation. Here in northern one another and with the professor while puzzling out New Mexico, youth climate activists have in the last two problems together. She’s missing the (let’s face it) erotic weeks established a thriving and rapidly growing mutual goodness of real learning that happens in direct physical aid system, whereby individuals are offering all sorts of interchange with one another, when so much of what gifts and skills to the wider community, wherein anyone is really discovered happens at a bodily-felt level below can request needed help and be matched, fairly quickly, the strictly cognitive layer of the words. The completely conscious layer of learning rides on that depth like ripples on the surface of the sea. Wisdom arises—whether within a student or a teacher, or within the awareness of an entire class—when the verbal, cognitive layer of learning is awake to its rootedness in the emotionally charged dimension of our corporeal and intercorporeal life with one another, in the palpable rooms and landscapes we inhabit together.

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spring will be exploding out of all those budded branches.

So while I trust that there’s a lot we’ll be learning from the strangeness of these days in enforced isolation from And that is a goodness. If you live anywhere near a each other, I sure hope that we’ll not be drawing upon wetland, pay it an evening visit—see if you can join your this time to swivel huge swaths of our public and private voice to the gurgling chorus of frogs without shocking life permanently into the virtual sphere, away from them all into silence (it takes practice, sure, but I promise the necessarily fraught and vulnerable world of fleshly it’s doable). encounter in the thick of the sensuous—which, I hasten Sit down for tea with a lichen- encrusted boulder. to add, is the only world that we share with the other Excellent. Now get over your shyness, wander over to the animals, the plants, and the blustering winds. I mean, do bank of the river that courses through your town, and we really wish to render education even more abstract invite the gushing current to dance with you. If it accepts, and aloof from the perspectives of other creatures, from you needn’t plunge in (maybe save that for the summer), the intricately entangled wetlands and rivers, from the but rather gaze and listen and feel into the flux as you many-voiced forests with whom we share this round move—let its wildness tumble downstream through your world? Do we really need to render ourselves still more muscles, coaxing the river into rapport with your own oblivious to the reality of other, nonhuman sinuous moves and meanders, experimenting lives? If so, then by all means let’s all pile till you find the right rhythm, the right online, and look to conduct more syncopation for the erotic rock and roll of and more of our lives in virtual its alluvial groove. spaces.… But the cascading Estranged from direct catastrophes of climate change, Sure, it’s mighty important to keep and our apparent inability (or apprised of the human news. Yet we human contact for a brief unwillingness) to alter our lives can draw unexpected nourishment while, we’ve a chance to in response to those cataclysms, by walking away, now and then, from suggest that it might be salutary open a new intimacy with the screen-mediated sphere of our for us to replenish our direct, exclusively human concerns, rekindling the wider world sensorial contact with the wider our animal senses and rediscovering our community of beings wherever solidarity with everything else. we live. We might wish to reacquaint SO SOME OF us are now learning to listen in ourselves with the other denizens of our to and maybe even converse with the elemental locale. utterances of things that don’t speak in words, tuning After all, while this plague enforces a temporary our ears and our skin to the discourse of multiple otherdistance from other humans, there is no reason not to than-human beings: each redwing blackbird or storm lean in close to other beings, gazing and learning—for cloud or naked chunk of sandstone jostling with the rest instance—the distinguishing patterns of the bark worn of existence. And every one of us is now shuddering with by each of the local tree species where you live. No reason inadvertent creaturely empathy at what’s befalling so not to step outside and pry open your ears, listening and many of our human sisters and brothers who abruptly find learning by heart the characteristic songs and calls of the themselves unable to draw breath, their lungs ravaged, various local birds; no reason not to apprentice yourself their bodies cut off by plastic enclosures and pumps from to a spider as it weaves its intricate web in front of the the touch or even the sight of their loved ones. porchlight. Or to practice recognizing and naming—as We breathe for each other. We feel each other’s feelings I have been—the different types of clouds that are shuddering through us—we cannot help but do so! Yet conjured out of the blue by the scattered mountains in is this because we’re all human, because we share a basic this region, the wispy brushstrokes and phantom ridges commonality of body and mind, because our species has and clumped clusterstha t congregate and dissipate in the its own autonomy and autonomous integrity, such that all high desert sky. of Humankind is a single collective Body that flexes and Estranged from direct human contact for a brief while, reverberates in each one of us? we’ve a chance to open a new intimacy with the wider Such is our common assumption, but actually … no, I world we’re a part of, with coyote and owl and aspen. don’t think so. If we consider the extant and far- flung span Soon enough, if it’s not already happening where you are,

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of our collective human flesh—if we consider the actual spatial shape of this hopelessly spread out thing we call humankind, we will notice, I think, that its shape is that of a sphere.

living Body of this biosphere, breathing. That’s us.

STILL, THERE’S THE rising tide of human happenings reaching us through the media, much of it sad beyond reckoning. One massive matter that this virus is abruptly making visible, for those who couldn’t or wouldn’t see it Because it is the vast and spherical Earth that gives us our before is the dumbfounding injustice—the outrageous actual shape and coherence as a species. coldheartedness—of the way our societies are currently And if we ponder the activity of any individual human at structured, such that some persons seem always able this very moment, we’ll notice that he or she or they are to avail themselves of protection from the devastation breathing (or struggling to breathe)—each of us drinking of illness (having ready access to tests, and fine doctors, this unseen elixir that’s granted to us, ceaselessly—by and all the necessary machinic support) while crowds the innumerable rooted, leafing, needled, stemmed, of others are tossed aside or treated grotesquely. Like trunked, or algal beings that are also breathing in our the undocumented immigrants currently crammed vicinity. We have no autonomy, no integrity as a into overcrowded detention centers here in species separate from the other species of the US: how can we keep the virus from this world, no collective existence as running rampant in such spaces? Or a creature apart from the animate overseas: how can we protect, from Earth. We can understand ourselves, the spreading contagion and death, and feel what it is to be human, countless half-starved Syrian We have no autonomy, only through our interaction and refugees now stranded and engagement with all these other, no integrity as a species stateless? Or the laid off workers nonhuman beings with whom our in India now trying to make their separate from the other lives are so thoroughly tangled. way back to their rural villages species of this world And yes, of course we can and in overstuffed buses or on foot indeed do feel a deep solidarity through a gauntlet of regulations with one another, and with the rest and club-wielding police? And here at of our kind. Yet we cannot stretch that home: how can we protect our brothers bodily empathy out to all of our single and sisters doing time in private, for-profit species except by way of the more-thanprisons without even minimally adequate human Earth. We cannot extend our senses to the sanitation? Or the many who are homeless and whole of humankind without the sensitive and sentient destitute, usually through no fault of their own?

Earth getting us there. It is this vast and sensitive sphere, Healthcare, as both Sanders and Warren proclaimed over glimmering with sensations, that grants us that ability to and over, ain’t a privilege: it’s a basic human right. We feel and resonate with one another, to ache when another instinctively feel that everyone deserves respect and the aches—whether it be a small girl hospitalized in right to live out their days, that no human should have to Iran or a young elephant whose mother was killed by forfeit their life simply because they’ve only ever earned poachers, whether an old man struggling to breathe minimum wage, or due to their skin color, or their age, or in China or an aging sea lion snagged and tangled in their refugee status. a fishing net. Our real collective Flesh is not that of But as this pandemic swells and breaks like a colossal “humankind” as an autonomous abstraction, but is the tsunami across the land, it strips away the flimsy facades, exposing all the god- awful structural violence of this winner-take-all society, leaving most of us feeling astonished and ashamed that we could have allowed such hideous disparities to grow and grow without struggling steadily to rectify them.

I reckon we’ll no longer be able to easily hide or paper over much of this structural violence after the virus has had its way with us. At least I pray that we won’t. We

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will have to change. In ever so many ways, we’ll have to change. (Dear Gaia, let us PLEASE not go back to fucking “normal.”) But what shape, what mode will the changes take? Will we simply go back to the rickety Rube Goldberg contraption of “Obamacare” and just extend it to cover a few more people? Might we begin to notice that a person’s health depends on having a range of real relationships, on face-to-face community, on reciprocity with a robust and flourishing ecology? Or will we strive now to make our lives ever more antiseptic, engaging not only our social interactions but more and more of our education online, so we’ll not have to risk contamination through physical contact—so we’ll not have to tangle with the always unpredictable muck of the real? Will we all be so desperate to have everything go back to “normal” that we’ll rev and rev and ramp back up our overly addicted fossil-fueled economy, injecting gobs of crude oil back into our veins like strung out junkies, throwing the megamachine into overdrive? And in this way consign our own and every other remaining species—those we’ve not already crowded and kicked over the brink of extinction—to the irreversible hell of runaway climate change?

Or will we recognize the coronavirus as a fierce but relatively gentle harbinger of something far more calamitous, a teacher kindly sent to slap us awake to our actual circumstances?

Much that influences the future shape of our societies will ride on how we emerge from this crisis—assuming we do emerge—how we transition out of the strangely suspended dreamscape in which we suddenly find ourselves adrift. Governments and their administrative agencies will play their roles as best they can, each trying to claw or engineer its way back into the daylit realm.

But the textures and tastes that eventually come to predominate, the rhythms of community in our bioregion, the generosity and convivial ethos of the larger body politic—or the robotic and bureaucratic rigidity of that body politic—will to a large extent be determined by the choices each of us makes in this cocoon-like, shapeshifting moment. The future will be sculpted, that is, by the elemental friendships and alliances that we choose to sustain us, by our full-bodied capacity for earthly compassion and dark wonder, by our ability to listen, attentive and at ease, within the forest of our unknowing.

Credits Writer David Abram David Abram, PhD, is a cultural ecologist and philosopher. He is the founder and creative director of the Alliance for Wild Ethics. His books include Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology and The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-than-Human World.

Artists Lina Müller Lina Müller is an illustrator based in Central Switzerland. She studied at the Lucerne School of Art and Design, Zurich University of the Arts, and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków. She is the recipient of numerous awards and was nominated for the 2017 Swiss Design Awards.

Luca Schenardi Luca Schenardi is a Swiss-based illustrator and artist. He studied at the Lucerne School of Art and Design. His illustrations have appeared in international newspapers and magazines, including Süddeutsche Zeitung, Die Zeit, and Rolling Stone Magazine.

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Spectres Gaele Sabott One million fish

swim bladders thumping a frantic beat

to rising howls in regional accents

from the Barwon from the Darling from the Murray vibrating in unison at screech frequency Raise the alarm

search for flow for faster current anonymous skulls

with wide-open mouths

sluggish now in slowest motion

floating bloated corpses

belly-up white clouded eyes

staring at the dying stench

sour ammonia nightmares One million fish die to a frantic beat Murray cod golden and silver perch

bony bream with shining spirit skins

their ghostly swim bladders whisper the way

to traditional breeding grounds

they flex their scaled bodies

tails swing gossamer-thin to and fro

back fins push

muscles expand

muscles relax

translucent on the night air

one million dead fish haunt our grim earth

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What She Does Not Know Abbey of the Arts

https://vimeo.com/444176056

Three Stories of Our Time Anna Swisher

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sF5zuBwopQw

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Death Came Dancing In On A Stick…

April-Kaye Ikinci My friend took me in extreme pain, to Alfred Hospital (Melbourne) Emergency, where they put me in a coma to save my life. After 4 days, I “awoke” on machines in Intensive Care Unit, learning I would live, cause unknown.

Shocked, dealing with my nearly dying, I part– convalescenced, sat in the aftermath to slowly heal with the spectre of dealing with resuscitation and death always there. I painted the beginning of this image. The shocking contrasting central motifs came in one with title, both new to me, shamanlike, which was apt at Death’s unexpected appearance.

The surprising, amusing theatrical aspect, despite the serious experience and subject for me, predicated the

unexpectedness, the fear and horror of approaching death, the remembered pain, the drama and the mundaneness, the miracle of survival due to the care and diligence of others, the continuing aftermath, the hope and preciousness of a future, and gratitude of each day’s potential. The in-you-face-of-it-all.

It felt right: full of symbols, signs, personal codes, signifiers.

Over time the colour came in. Some viewers expressed discomfort commenting about conflated surrealist or disparate techniques, especially the skull/head on the stick simultaneously frightening and frightened.

As a long-term painter, I feel honoured that it sang me.

April-Kaye Ikinci 2020

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Water & Light: A Strange Masquerade James Eric Watkins In-between the clumps of moss the moonlight flashes splashes onto the rocks below drops of contemplation randomly escape the collective pool of thoughts awakening one organism and causing the death of another while the near-by shadows are always doing costume changes in this strange masquerade of water and light where the night lies quietly against my skin and the ceremony is always about to begin.

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Definition of going forth 1. archaic : a way or place of exit mark well the entering in of the house, with every going forth of the sanctuary— Ezekiel 44:5 (Authorized Version) 2. archaic : BOUNDARY and the going forth thereof shall be from the south to Kadesh-barnea— Numbers 34:4 (Authorized Version) “Going forth.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/going%20forth. Accessed 7 Nov. 2020.

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Already my gaze is upon the hill, the sunlit one.

The way to it, barely begun, lies ahead.

So we are grasped by what we have not grasped, full of promise, shining in the distance.

It changes us, even if we do not reach it, into something we barely sense, but are; A movement beckons, answering our movement …

But we just feel the wind against us.

— Rainer Maria Rilke

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Anam Cara House Colac is a Community founded and funded Hospice caring for people of all ages in the South West of Victoria. Established in 2012, following the hard work and dedication of a group of local volunteers who formed a Committee of Management and inspired the local region and beyond to support the concept and importance of local, community driven Hospice care in rural Victoria. Many volunteers donated time, many local people and business supported the hospice’s growth and development with financial support and donated materials and labour.

After nearly 9 years of supporting the region with the provision of hospice care including end of life care, short term respite for people with life limiting illnesses and day respite services, Anam Cara has grown and evolved.

Over this time, we have added other layers of support to help people and their carers cope with their illness, a free equipment loan service, a free advance care planning service, bereavement support and a Parkinson’s Support Group. We also offer in home respite to people thought to be in the last 3 months of life, to support the carer and their families to manage the stressors of the caring role towards the end of life. All these services have developed from the feedback from the communities we serve and support and the needs of the people in our region.

Anam Cara Colac is a Quality Improvement Council Accredited Service (QIC). We provide a model of care that focuses on supporting all the needs of the guest (patient) and their family. We support people to help them achieve the highest quality of life that can be achieved in accordance with their illness. Physical, social, psychological, emotional and spiritual needs are assessed, and care is delivered to ensure that we respect and support all identified needs and goals of the guest. Our commitment to the communities we serve is to provide 24/7 access to end of life care.

As Coronavirus emerged our Committee of Management and Executive team worked solidly to ensure that Anam Cara Colac was properly positioned to provide care to

our regional community. We responded to an invitation from Colac Area Health to meet with other local health providers to discuss the provision of health care in response to the declared Coronavirus Pandemic. The Management Team unhesitatingly committed to the provision of our ongoing care to the Colac Community, provided in the safest possible manner for both guests and staff.

Infection Control Standards and Policies were upgraded according to guidelines for Residential Aged Care provided by the Victorian Health Department. Additional information and mandatory infection control training was provided. Day Hospice Care was reluctantly suspended; however, the provision of short-term respite and end-oflife care has continued.

Anam Cara is well positioned to provide care within our smaller and more isolated community facility. Indeed from March through to September we were privileged to care for some 12 guests who came to Anam Cara Colac for end-of-life care and overall provided 497 episodes of overnight care for the March – September period, to 50 guests and their families. We acknowledge the support of the Community Palliative Care Team, Colac doctors, our staff, volunteers and local services who have enabled and supported our ongoing hospice care to the community.

If you are interested to know more about Anam Cara House Colac please get in touch. Sometimes people are unsure if we can support them or a person they care for, we suggest you pick up the phone and have a chat with us. We support people with any life limiting illness. This includes those with heart disease, brain or neurological diseases, kidney and lung diseases or indeed any other disease that is incurable. We have also supported several NDIS guests for access to respite and we are a registered NDIS care provider.

We are actively looking for additional casual Registered Nurses, Patient Care Attendants and Volunteers. If you are passionate about caring for some of our region’s most vulnerable and work with a compassionate and dedicated workforce we would love to hear from you.

We can be contacted on (03) 52338203 or manager@anamcarahousecolac.org.au you can also check our website at www.anamcarahousecolac.org.au or follow us on facebook https:www.facebook.com/AnamCaraHouseColac

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Silvereye John Bartlett I could spend my life watching Silvereye bathing, the plunge and the flight, the delight of light on droplets exploding.

Nearby branches trembling, they queue for landing like 747s at Heathrow but patient, not urgent, no timetable to meet, they preen, absorbing the slow hum of evening then flit into twilight leaving an imprint of stillness.

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for the Mad Farmer - Thinking Peacefully Jason Rodenback for the Mad Farmer I saw the Mad Farmer outside the city standing defiant at the tree line; I heard his voice crying out for the wilderness from the false security of my sanitized room I witnessed his lonesome prophecy and I felt myself then for the first time hollow as I always had been chasing dreams of greatness and manufactured purpose, empty distractions and greedy comforts I heard his voice calling me, “Forget those! Know your smallness!

Inhabit your incompleteness!

Embrace your partiality, your connections to this earth and your neighbor!”

He said, “Listen to the birds in the trees; hear their songs carried by clean winds in the leaves while there still are birds and clean winds!

“Remember children’s voices as they play at working; find your own playfulness in the satisfaction of the peaceful work of your hands.

“Float the rivers and watch the heron fishing in the shallows as you ride their currents in the cool mist of the morning!

“Plunge your hands into the soil; plant a seed and watch it grow.

Take its nourishment in yourself and you will know again your own lost godliness.” when he spoke, I felt something deep inside my mind, some wild part of my ¥ that had once wandered free but had been locked away and hidden by ambition to rise above my place in the created order and that lie I was told about what it meant to “grow up” it was loosed, free to wonder and explore, and many of the answers I had sought in transcendent and timeless philosophies made themselves clear in the imminent and temporal truths of this earth, its lands and waters, its creatures, and our humanity stunned at this, I rushed down to the place at the edge of the trees where the mad farmer had been shouting; I came just in time to watch him turn “Wait, I have questions!” I called. as the old coot disappeared into the woods, he replied, “So do I, and precious few answers to speak of. But ain’t got time for that now. I’m going fishing.”

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In Silence Jenni Elmes Low murmur on the breeze.

Warm greetings from the sun.

Vapour whispers in raindrops.

Soon with Covid 19 restrictions lifted between South Australia and Victoria I will be a permanent resident of Colac.

A birdsong.

Excited to be coming home to the place of my birth and childhood.

A croak from a frog.

Loving memories of Colac Botanic Gardens.

Wildness ancient yearnings.

With bush and sea not far away.

Ancestral breath of presence.

Spiderweb to nature timeline.

Our nucleus belonging.

We are of the natural world.

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Renee Karacsay - Wild Women How long have you been painting and what/who has been your inspiration?

I have been playing with colour and paint from four years old. After leaving high school I decided to follow the visual arts as a career. It’s the vibrant details of nature that has been the most powerful inspirations for my art. From the Waratahs in my childhood garden to the rise of the waves on the surf coast.

What is your favourite medium and technique?

Oil and acrylic painting. Using colour to build depth, emotion and memory into my paintings.

How has the COVID 19 pandemic affected you and your art?

Being isolated with only the waves, nature and my paint brushes has lead me to create this new collection Wild Women. The collection documents the community I found in the ocean while being socially distanced. Kindness, grace and power I was lucky enough to witness staggering kindness, grace and power during such a challenging time.

What are your hopes for the future - as an artist and as a human being on this fragile planet?

As an art teacher I hope to celebrate every student’s creative potential, unlocking the limiting beliefs we place on ourselves, we are all so much creative than we believe.

I hope we wake up to take care of our planet, animals and each other. I hope we overcome this isolation, separation and polarisation and reclaim our balance with the land.

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Five Ways to Create Self-Care During Self-Isolation Kit Kline

As we spend more and more time alone, or in varying levels of lockdown, the importance of creating wellbeing by having a sensory connection to ourselves has never been higher.

Developing awareness of the body, an exercise in mindfulness, is paramount to grounding and switching on our parasympathetic nervous system.

When stressful events such as Covid-19 create another layer of tension, we may tend to ruminate and overthink things.

We can employ our five senses as a way to connect to our body and the natural world within us and around us.

Often when we are feeling stressed we remain in a state of flight or flight, which in turn, keeps our cortisol levels on high alert.

By incorporating Nature Based Therapy and our inherent connection to nature, we are supported to get out of our head and into our body.

We can do that by employing our five senses as a way to connect to our body and the natural world within us

and around us.

Practical Ways to Bring the Outside In TASTE When looking at the natural world within us, it’s important to consider what food we choose to put into our bodies.

What we eat plays a major part in helping us to restore balance within our digestive system.

Our body is an ecosystem. More than 90 per cent of the body’s serotonin is synthesized in the gut. In fact, our gut is often described as our second brain.

Read more about it here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4393509/” Soups, stews and warm, slow cooked hearty meals that retain nutrients are perfect for this time.

Think: this welcoming winter soup that ticks a lot of the boxes. https://www.sbs.com.au/food/recipes/lamb-shank-vegetable-and-barley-broth Even though you may be working from home, stopping to make a family meal or even just for yourself can take time away from your desk.

Setting yourself up to succeed can start by using a few minutes in your morning to create a meal to simmer away in your slow cooker, ready for the end of the day.

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SOUND Bringing in nature sounds or water features in the home can be another way to improve our connection, while supporting us to ground via our five senses.

Inside your home, or within an an outdoor living space in your back yard, the sound of nature can be extremely soothing to the central nervous system.

When you listen to a river flowing, there is something very relaxing and grounding about running water. I think it reminds us that nature is in a continual flow and that we need to keep moving with the flow regardless of what’s going on in our lives.

TOUCH Tending to indoor plants is a great way to bring nature into your environment.

There are many plants that will love your company and will provide beautiful greenery to your work and living space.

I have a Peace Lilly at home. When i forget to water it, it goes a bit limp. This to me is a reminder to take care of not just my plant but myself as well.

I am prompted to ask myself: How well have I been hydrating? What do I need to do to take care of myself in this moment?

SCENT Opening up windows and doors every morning, even though it can get chilly in some areas, is still a worthwhile way to start the day in a mindful and body centred way.

Fresh air and inviting the scent of our natural environment in can have a calming and emerging effect.

A vaporiser or oil burner for essential oils can be beneficial for cleansing the air.

Scents like lavender can have a relaxing effect, rosemary has a pick me up effect as well as an ability to enhance memory.

SIGHT Sight gives us the ability to view relaxing colours and images that put our body in a rest and digest state.

Evoking a memory of a time when we felt connected and grounded in the sight of nature such as the ocean, a mountain, or a field, has the ability to reconnect us to what we perceive as beautiful and relaxing.

What I like to recommend, especially during self-isolation, is for people to take themselves back to a space or place they felt connected to in nature. A photo from your most recent happy holiday of an experience you had in nature can take you back to that happy place and make you feel relaxed and grounded all over again.

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Time to heal: Uluru healing the people and the land Thomas Mayor This entire continent, now called Australia, was once a Dreaming. A place where flora, fauna, humankind and the land itself, together, determined the values and laws of First Nations society. We had no need for printed tomes, because our Dreaming, far older than any European text, was handed down in oral traditions from generation to generation, from custodian to custodian, in stories and song as far back as the Ice Age.

First Nations have made a new beginning possible The Uluru Statement from the Heart is a gift to the Australian people. I don’t say that to be poetic or to pull heartstrings. I say it because it is, practically, the gift of opportunity.

Presented in the centre of a canvas that is 1.8 metres wide and 1.6 metres high, the Uluru Statement is a magnificent sacred object imbued with political and cultural power.

What a dream life was for my ancestors on this great Surrounding the words is a painting of four Anangu southern continent. We were the most peaceful societies Songlines tracking from the north, east, south and west to on the planet. All things had a place and moiety, and intersect in the middle where the statement is printed and therefore all things were related. Our laws maintained Uluru, the rock, would be. The painting is by Anangu balance and resolved disputes; no living being law women Rene Kulitja, Charmaine Kulitja, was incarcerated; our culture was one of Christine Brumby and Happy Reid, and sharing and respect. How else, experts their names are inscribed between the agree, could hundreds of unique artwork and statement along with the languages evolve for hundreds of names of the 250 First Nations people First Nations in one common land, ... the Uluru Statement is a who endorsed it on 26 May 2017 at over 60,000 years? the Uluru National Constitutional magnificent sacred object Australia has much to learn from Convention. The creation of this gift imbued with political and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander was so profound and of such great ways, and thanks to my peoples’ national significance that it must be cultural power. resilience and resistance, Indigenous understood. custodianship survives to this day.

At the Uluru National Constitutional Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Convention, the participants had come knowledge is what Australia needs to from all points of the southern sky. We awaken us from our colonial nightmare— were there representing the accurate records of to cease our growing cruelty to the vulnerable, thirteen regional dialogues who elected us. Like any large to redistribute hoarded wealth, and to end the selfpolitical gathering working towards a collective resolution, destructive neglect of Mother Earth. we had passionate debates and tense negotiations. Of But to be worthy of Indigenous knowledge—in fact, to course we did—we were talking about changing the exercise Indigenous knowledge—Australia must first rulebook of the nation, the Constitution, no less. accept Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander sovereignty The three-day convention was emotionally draining. Not and hear our collective voice in the centre of decisionjust because we felt the weight of responsibility to our making. First Nations people have decided how we people, but also because of the stinging attacks from should do this: we have called for the establishment of our detractors. Some predicted we would descend into a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution—a a screaming mess, assuming that that many Blackfellas guaranteed representative body—and invited you to walk could never come to an agreement. Others had a strange with us in the Uluru Statement from the Heart. expectation for Indigenous homogeneity, believing that if there were a few Black dissenters or disgruntled mob who were not invited or able to attend a dialogue, somehow the controversy would make a resolution

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unsupportable—an expectation that dehumanises and damages our cause.

We persevered, however, because we knew there was too much at stake—the status quo is killing us. We didn’t have the luxury of making vain, unachievable claims to placate extreme ideologies. And we couldn’t walk away refusing compromise among ourselves, leaving the next generation the same difficult task. It was time, our time, to decide how to make permanent progress. The Uluru National Constitutional Convention, the Elders expressed, was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for an unprecedented, and therefore powerful, Indigenous political consensus worth campaigning for.

read the Uluru Statement from the Heart for the very first time. With a calm, steady voice, standing between massive Indigenous flags at each end of the wide convention hall, she read:

The Uluru Statement from the Heart We, gathered at the 2017 National Constitutional Convention, coming from all points of the southern sky, make this statement from the heart: Our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander tribes were the first sovereign Nations of the Australian continent and its adjacent islands and possessed it under our own laws and customs. This our ancestors did, according to the reckoning of our culture, from the Creation, according to the common law from ‘time immemorial’, and according to science more than 60,000 years ago.

In First Nations politics, there has never been a consensus position reached through a national deliberative process on how to achieve This sovereignty is a spiritual notion: Indigenous goals such as strong It was time, our time, the ancestral tie between the land, or land rights, selfdetermination, ‘mother nature’, and the Aboriginal treaty, constitutional recognition to decide how to make and Torres Strait Islander peoples who and justice. These goals have all permanent progress. were born therefrom, remain attached been promised to us by prime thereto, and must one day return thither ministers before— none has to be united with our ancestors. This link been delivered. Before Uluru, as an is the basis of the ownership of the soil, activist on the streets, I realised the or better, of sovereignty. It has never been how was missing. It struck me that for ceded or extinguished, and co-exists with the five speakers on the stump, ten solutions sovereignty of the Crown. would be proposed to the crowd. I noticed that our actions were reactive and the politicians were never How could it be otherwise? That peoples possessed a land held to account. I listened to fellow Indigenous leaders, for sixty millennia and this sacred link disappears from and all too often, when asked what the steps to the grand world history in merely the last two hundred years? goals were, their answers were as vague as ‘unity’. I realised With substantive constitutional change and structural I was as vague as they were, and forced myself to ask: well, reform, we believe this ancient sovereignty can shine unity how? Tired of slogans without strategy at disjointed through as a fuller expression of Australia’s nationhood. rallies that never held politicians accountable for their broken promises and negligence, at Uluru I thought, this is our chance.

By the final morning on 26 May 2017, we had patched together the tattered lessons from the past and developed a roadmap to a better future. With bated breath, we watched Professor Megan Davis, an Aboriginal public law expert and one of the Indigenous members of the Referendum Council, as she stepped up to the podium to

Proportionally, we are the most incarcerated people on the planet. We are not an innately criminal people. Our children are aliened from their families at unprecedented rates. This cannot be because we have no love for them.

And our youth languish in detention in obscene numbers.

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They should be our hope for the future.

These dimensions of our crisis tell plainly the structural nature of our problem. This is the torment of our powerlessness.

We seek constitutional reforms to empower our people and take a rightful place in our own country. When we have power over our destiny our children will flourish.

They will walk in two worlds and their culture will be a gift to their country.

We call for the establishment of a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution.

Makarrata is the culmination of our agenda: the coming together after a struggle. It captures our aspirations for a fair and truthful relationship with the people of Australia and a better future for our children based on justice and selfdetermination.

We seek a Makarrata Commission to supervise a process of agreementmaking between governments and First Nations and truth-telling about our history.

unforgettably moving moment, and not just for ourselves as Indigenous peoples. We believed it was a moving moment for all Australians—a constitutional moment. As Laureate Professor Emeritus Cheryl Saunders AO described when I joined her and several other constitutional experts on a panel at the Melbourne University Law School ten months later: [Uluru was] a constitutional moment: a point in time at which people rise above their day-to-day preoccupations with a sense of collective purpose; to reach a sufficient consensus so as to make a new beginning possible. These moments are rare, and they need to be seized.

A Constitution frozen in time

We seek constitutional reforms to empower our people and take a rightful place in our own country.

In 1967 we were counted, in 2017 we seek to be heard. We leave base camp and start our trek across this vast country. We invite you to walk with us in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.

When Professor Davis finished reading these words, the entire room—250 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with as many different First Nations and perspectives—stood as one and endorsed the Uluru Statement from the Heart with raucous acclamation. Not one person remained seated. I saw people who had been in passionate debate against one another embracing while crying tears of joy and hope.

The endorsement of the Uluru Statement was an

If constitutional moments are rare—and indeed, the Australian Constitution is said to be frozen in time—from what time do our ‘fundamental principles’ that govern us come from? The answer doesn’t bode well for any of us fair-minded Australian people, especially those of us who are Indigenous.

The Australian Constitution was conceived from 100 years of genocide and slavery without remorse. In the late nineteenth century, on the bloody bed made for its birth, white British colonial men reached sufficient consensus on how to deliver the federalisation of a colonial nightmare. This was the first constitutional moment. Not one wretched Black soul was in the room— forsaken as a dying race. In 1901, the British subjects who became Australian voted to replace First Nations Dreaming with a bland, mechanical Constitution.

In the first forty years of the new federation, Australian massacres of Indigenous people continued. And beyond the first forty years, the overt and covert acts of wilful neglect and slavery were maintained into the modern age. The Australian Constitution was not challenged by these heinous acts. Australian democracy did not hold the perpetrators to account.

In these difficult circumstances, my Indigenous activist forebears campaigned to be counted as equal citizens

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and to be included in the federal government’s ‘race power’, section 51(xxvi). The hope was that the federal government would use the race power to wrest control of Indigenous affairs from the cruel and negligent states.

They succeeded in the 1967 referendum. More than 90 per cent of Australians, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voters, said ‘Yes’, we should be counted.

First Nations Voice—to centre Indigenous knowledge in decision-making and to build our political power so we may hold parliament to account.

Enshrining a First Nations Voice is prioritised over agreementmaking and truth-telling—partly because both are underway and partly because these proposals can be done at the state level and by acts of parliament, but mainly because both treaty and truth need a voice to effect them.

The result created the type of lasting change that only constitutional reform can provide—different from mere acts of parliament. In many ways, 1967 is the platform Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have that my generation stands on. But painfully for my done the hard work. We have learned from the past, Elders, their allies and the following generations, the strategised, prioritised and poured our hearts and our federal parliament broke the promise to use souls into a consensus providing Australia with a their acquired power to take control of rare opportunity. We are leading the way in Indigenous peoples from the states. the Uluru Statement campaign, refusing to When the federal government take no for an answer from politicians, finally did—beginning with Gough fighting for a referendum so the people When First Nations Whitlam’s short reign that was can decide if they will accept the gift ended by a constitutional crisis— have a place at the table, we offer them. From all indications, they were rarely genuine or the Australian people will say ‘Yes’. we bring the voice of the consistent, and too often worse As we consider ideas about how to land, the rivers, the sea, the than the states. address the twin crises of climate change flora and fauna.

Both state and federal and growing inequality, and as we plan governments have since bungled the steps we must take to reconstruct our Indigenous policy, squandered humanity and democracy, imagine how benevolent opportunity, and continued much better we would be with a constitutionally to oppress Indigenous empowerment. The empowered First Nations Voice at the table.

1967 constitutional moment, while important, When First Nations have a place at the table, we bring the fell terribly short of its mark. voice of the land, the rivers, the sea, the flora and fauna.

In 1901 we were excluded, in 1967 we were counted but When First Nations have a place at the table, we bring our not yet heard, and therefore, as a mere 3 per cent of the principles of sharing, collectivism and respect. population, First Nations people remain unrepresented in the cold Canberra halls of democracy. With indifference, If we believe that Australia should keep dreaming, we the government wields its power to make special laws for must accept that the Dreaming constitutes us. us as a ‘race’. Australia is trapped in its past; it’s time for constitutional change.

We must accept that the Dreaming constitutes us Australia can only reckon with its past when we have changed the constitutional structure that excludes First Nations people. We will only heal when we have power over our own destiny. This is why the Uluru Statement prioritises the proposal to constitutionally enshrine a

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What Happens Next?

Reconstructing Australia after COVID-19 Emma Dawson, Janet McCalman In the wake of a global pandemic, Australia’s most respected experts chart the way forward.

Long before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the global economy, a reset to serve the wellbeing of people and the planet was plainly needed. As Australia rebuilds, after the immediate health crisis has passed, it must be with the explicit purpose of constructing an economically and ecologically sustainable world. After the Great Depression and the Second World War, economic thinking was transformed across the Anglosphere, with a determination to create a more equitable society and support every child, regardless of background, to achieve their full potential. Australia’s leaders reshaped our economy through a determined and coordinated program of post-war reconstruction. Their reforms set us up for decades of prosperity and the creation of perhaps the most prosperous and stable society on earth. With contributions from some of Australia’s most respected academics and leading thinkers, What Happens Next? sets out a progressive, reforming agenda to tackle the twin crises of climate change and inequality. It provides a framework through which our collective effort can be devoted to improving the lives of all Australians, and the sustainability of the world in which we live.

Contributors include: Emma Dawson; Professor Janet McCalman AC; The Hon. Anthony Albanese MP; Thomas Mayor; Dr Liz Allen; Professor Clinton Fernandes; Dr Shireen Morris; Osmond Chiu; Michele O’Neil; Professor Fiona Stanley; Professor Mike Daube AO; and Dr Jim Chalmers.

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Weeyn Yakeen - Fire Dreaming Fire & Rain Conversations Series - Episode 2. John Clarke and Jack Pascoe

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OERIqhrr3yg

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Shaping a Brave New World

by Karina Donkers When I was really little I use to have this feeling that I didn’t fully belong to the time I grew up in. It was like a sense of discomfort I had in my body that I didn’t quite fit into this world. So being little and having these feelings I use to idolise and romanticize 1960s, believing it to be the time of radical change and activism, feeling like my soul was more suited for those times than the one I was born into. I remember when I was younger saying to my mum that I wanted to be part of a movement of change in my lifetime. Being so passionate about social justice and human rights I felt called to be a part of something significant that would shape the world for the better.

When speaking to my mum I used this as example of why I would have been better suited for 1960s and the ‘hippy’ era. My mum smiled to herself about my complete stereotype of those times and turned to me and said,

‘don’t worry my love you will be part of a movement, one much greater than the ones that have come before as your future is being shaped by climate change. This issue is going to be your greatest challenge that you will face in your lifetime, you belong right where you are’.

Not knowing a whole lot about climate change at this young age, I just stared at her and thought to myself- she doesn’t understand, I really feel like I don’t belong in these times. I then forgot about this conversation and yearning and went on with my day-to-day life. It wasn’t until I was in my early teens when I properly learnt about climate change that I realised she was right, climate change is the greatest challenge of our times. It is a profoundly complex problem that is providing the human race with challenges we have never faced before. It wasn’t until I was in my mid 20s, when I was ten or so years into being active in the climate movement that I realised that this time in history is exactly where I was supposed to be.

This time in history is exactly where EVERY single person on this planet who is here now were supposed to be born into. I believe that everyone is needed in some way or another to address this challenge we are facing. Everyone is needed because I believe we are a unique piece of the puzzle for this time and for this movement that is literally SHAPING the story of the human race.

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Now more than ever the actions and decisions of the individual and the collective matter on a whole other level. I acknowledge and honour that climate change is complex issue that holds extreme consequences but I also acknowledge the opportunity that lies within the rubble.

For me that opportunity is about creating a different future, one that is honouring of all life.

I have designed my life around this movement and of being in service to the collective and the Earth.

I am here to tell you that you are not too young to make an impact, nor too old either. Wherever you are at in your journey I am here to tell you that your actions are powerful. I started my journey in the climate movement by the simple will to make an impact. When I first began I couldn’t believe what was happening in the world around me and I was shocked that there were so few young people, at the time, who were a part of the discussion and movement around climate change. My journey started with the willingness to engage and be involved. I could see a gap that needed to be filled: bringing and engaging more young people in climate action.

It was about providing a platform and space for young people to feel empowered to make a difference in shaping their future. This was the invitation from the wider world, to do something about this, to act! And even though so many different parts of me did not want to lead or stand up and be seen, I did! Because that’s what standing for something bigger than yourself does, it gives you the courage to step outside of your comfort zone. That is where my journey began, by being willing and responding to the invitation to act.

Looking back, I couldn’t be any more grateful for responding to this invitation. It has opened so many doors in my life and provided me with profound opportunities and experiences that I would never have had if I wasn’t willing and if I didn’t take the first step to act. I have since run climate conferences for young people; I have lobbied politicians in parliament house; I have worked internationally and locally on climate campaigns and projects; I have worked with vulnerable species including the magical humpback whale (one of my favourite animals); I have stood on the frontlines and I have had a range of other experiences through working to address climate change, reconnect people to Earth and create a better future. I didn’t do this to receive these amazing experiences, they just happened. This is often the case when we take a lead and make a big step towards something that matters, along the way we get these

transformative moments that shape us so we are ready to respond to the next invitation to act.

When I first started did I know what I was doing or how to do it? No way! Did I have all the necessary skills and knowledge to pull off the things I wanted to do? I surely didn’t. Was I confident and comfortable in being a leader?

Defiantly not! But that’s ok! Not many people do when they begin, you learn and grow along the way. I think the problem is that we often look at the people who have already done the stuff and be like: ‘there is no way I can do what they did.’ But what we are witnessing is their final product, we are not witnessing all the steps that it took for them to get there or how they felt along the way. They just began wherever they were at and learnt and developed along the way. Life has a way of providing us with the experiences to prepare us for our next step, it’s just about saying yes and making the action. I now train climate leaders from all over the world!

I also get to work with people to integrate earth-centred frameworks into their business and lifestyles. I continue my work in campaigning, change making and in the climate movement. It all started with me being willing, and beginning with one action at a time to work towards addressing climate change.

So this is your invitation to begin on your own journey, to take that first step. Start that environment group at your school, have that conversation, attend that rally, join that group, install those solar panels, learn more about climate solutions, run that event, create that resource - whatever it is, do it! I believe that we are being invited to create a world that is something more than what we currently have, one that is the mixture of the old ancient wisdom with the new gifts and knowledge of this time.

So if you are like me and for whatever reason you also feel or have felt that discomfort in your body of not feeling like this is the society you belong to, maybe it is because you are here to shape a new one. Maybe that feeling is not a negative thing but a divine indication that you are here to carve out a future that is sustaining of all life. A future that is more connected, equitable, and honouring of all life and of nature.

So I guess the moral of the story is that mums do always know best….

Want to know more about my story, my journey and my work then connect through www.karinadonkers.com and follow me on Instagram @karinadonkers

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Entering the Bardo

by Joanna Macy

The Jina Buddha Akshobhya, Folio from a Pancharaksha (The Five Protective Charms). Courtesy of LACMA

In this op-ed, eco-philosopher and Buddhist scholar Joanna Macy introduces us to the bardo—the Tibetan Buddhist concept of a gap between worlds where transition is possible.

As the pandemic reveals ongoing collapse and holds a mirror to our collective ills, she writes, we have the opportunity to step into a space of reimagining.

despair and apathy into collaborative action. Like the Mirror Wisdom of Akshobhya, the Work That Reconnects helps people tell the truth about what they see and feel is happening to our world. It also helps them find the motivation, tools, and resources for taking part in our collective self-healing.

We are in a space without a map.

When we come together for this work, at the outset we discern three stories or versions of reality that are shaping our world so that we can see them more clearly and choose which one we want to get behind. The first narrative we identify is “Business as Usual,” by which we mean the growth economy, or global corporate capitalism.

We hear this marching order from virtually every voice in government, publicly traded corporations, the military, and corporate controlled media.

With the likelihood of economic collapse and climate catastrophe looming, it feels like we are on shifting ground, where old habits and old scenarios no longer apply. In Tibetan Buddhism, such a space or gap between known worlds is called a bardo. It is frightening. It is also a place of potential transformation.

As you enter the bardo, there facing you is the Buddha Akshobhya. His element is Water. He is holding a mirror, for his gift is Mirror Wisdom, reflecting everything just as it is. And the teaching of Akshobhya’s mirror is this: Do not look away. Do not avert your gaze. Do not turn aside. This teaching clearly calls for radical attention and total acceptance.

For the last forty years, I’ve been growing a form of experiential group work called the Work That Reconnects.

It is a framework for personal and social change in the face of overwhelming crises—a way of transforming

The second is called “The Great Unraveling”: an ongoing collapse of living structures. This is what happens when ecological, biological, and social systems are commodified through an industrial growth society or “business as usual” frame. I like the term “unraveling,” because systems don’t just fall over dead, they fray, progressively losing their coherence, integrity, and memory.

The third story is the central adventure of our time: the transition to a life-sustaining society. The magnitude and scope of this transition— which is well underway when we know where to look—is comparable to the agricultural revolution some ten thousand years ago and the industrial revolution a few centuries back. Contemporary social thinkers have various names for it, such as the ecological or sustainability revolution; in the Work That Reconnects we call it the Great Turning.

Simply put, our aim with this process of naming and deep recognition of what is happening to our world is to survive

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the first two stories and to keep bringing more and more people and resources into the third story.

X put it, “When we change the ‘I’ for the ‘We,’ even Illness becomes Wellness.”

Through this work, we can choose to align with business as usual, the unraveling of living systems, or the creation of a life-sustaining society.

The patterns of contagion then cast a spotlight on what we most need to see: nursing homes, where old people are warehoused; the meatpacking industry, so dangerous to the crowded workers, so cruel to the animals, so costly to the climate; prisons, where millions are locked away, now becoming petri dishes of contamination; the fault lines of racial inequality in our society, now laid bare in the pandemic’s disproportionate impacts on Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities.

Over the last couple of years, a number of us involved in this work have recognized that, given the pace of the Great Unraveling, we are heading toward economic and, indeed, civilizational collapse. Our thinking was aided by the Deep Adaptation work of Jem Bendell, which seeks to prepare for—and live with—societal breakdown. I’d also like to acknowledge the earlier contributions in Frenchspeaking Europe of Pablo Servigne and Raphael Stevens—whose prescient work focuses on collapse and transition and is only just now coming out in English.

Since the present world economy has been unable to cut greenhouse gas emissions by even the slightest fraction of a degree, it now seems obvious that we cannot avoid climate catastrophe. Many of us had assumed that the Great Turning could forestall such disintegration, but now we have come to recognize the Great Turning as a process and a commitment to help us survive the breakdown of the industrialized growth economy. The motivation and skills we gain by engaging in the Work That Reconnects provide the guidance, solidarity, and trust needed to make our way through this inevitable breakdown.

There are many dimensions to this work that address the psychological and spiritual issues of the time, and I have found a fruitful resonance between Buddhist thought and postmodern science: much of the Work That Reconnects has been informed by Buddhist teachings. I now think of the Great Turning as somewhat like bodhicitta, the intention to serve all beings. This is the mind state of the bodhisattva —the being who, in their great compassion, delays nirvana in order to address the world’s suffering. I remember my Tibetan teachers telling me that bodhicitta is like a flame in the heart, and often I can feel it there.

It can seem pretty clear now who is holding up Akshobhya’s mirror—it is COVID-19. The coronavirus has come upon us fast. We knew nothing of it just a short while ago. First it made us pause so we could take in what the mirror is reflecting. We’ve been so busy and distracted in our different versions of the rat race that we haven’t been able to pay attention to our actual situation. We had to cease our rushing about in order to see who, what, and where we are.

COVID-19 reminds us that apocalypse—in its ancient meaning—connotes revelation and unveiling. And what has it unveiled? A pandemic so contagious that it immediately revealed our failed health care system and our utter interdependence. The need to prioritize the collective nature of our wellbeing dramatically rose to the surface, especially within our country, which is the most hyper-individualized country in the world. As Malcolm

Sixty percent of the cases are African-American—thanks to pre-existing conditions fostered by inequities in health care and environmental racism.

On top of that, the killing of George Floyd has not only revealed the racism and brutality of our police culture, but aroused unparalleled protests, sweeping the country and calling for the defunding and even abolition of police departments and unions.

Globally as well as in the US, many of us are discovering a new solidarity in our determination to move beyond the sick racism we’ve inherited. In this Uprising, I am inspired by the courage, creativity, and perseverance of those engaging in public demonstrations, who are influencing many civil servants to take action— members of city councils, agencies, and even police departments. It is no wonder that the bardo represents a place where the unknown, even the inconceivable, can happen and where we who enter are profoundly changed.

When we dare to face the cruel social and ecological realities we have been accustomed to, courage is born and powers within us are liberated to reimagine and even, perhaps one day, rebuild a world.

Do not look away. Do not avert your gaze.

Do not turn aside.

Credits Writer Joanna Macy Joanna Macy, Ph.D., is an ecophilosopher and a scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology. As the founder and root teacher of the Work That Reconnects, Joanna has created frameworks for personal and social change, transforming despair and apathy into constructive change.

She has written numerous books, including Widening Circles, her personal memoir, and World as Lover, World as Self: Courage for Global Justice and Ecological Renewal.

Joanna is widely known for her translations of Rainer Maria Rilke’s poetry.

This article was first published in Resurgence & Ecologist issue 283, March/April 2014 . All rights to this article are reserved to The Resurgence Trust. To buy a copy of the magazine, read further articles or find out about the Trust, visit www.resurgence.org

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The Wolves of Lenteme

by Mirakye Barnes aged 12 years Chapter 1 Spark opened her eyes. It had been two weeks since her mother had disappeared. Spark didn’t remember her mother, Blazing Spirit, but she knew that she had been born just before her mother had gone missing. Most of Fire Pack believed that Blazing Spirit had died while the Grass Healer had gone to fetch water, but Spark still believed she was out there… somewhere.

Although one of her brothers had died at birth, she still had three brothers and one sister, Lava, Ash, Burning Branch and Fire Flower. Being only fourteen days old they were not allowed out of the nursing den as it was perched on the edge on Fire Mountain.

The she-wolf, Cinder, cared for her and her littermates. Even though Cinder was protective of them, she still didn’t feel like their true mother. Cinder’s own litter had all died so Spark knew why she enjoyed having cubs to care for again.

“Come on! Let’s play fire floor.” Her sister’s happy yelp jerked Spark from her thoughts.

“Fine,” Spark yelped back. “But I’m going to beat you!”

Spark’s brother Ash started to play but Lava and Burning Branch hung back.

“Come on scaredy tail,” Spark called. “You think I’m going to beat you?”

Spark loved all her littermates, but her and her sister, Fire Flower, had a special bond.

Spark crouched, narrowing her eyes playfully. “I am Dark Pack’s Alpha. You must do as I say.” As she said that, she jumped on Ash’s back and started pummelling him with her strong hind legs.

“That’s not fair,” whined Ash. “She hurt me.”

“Play nicely,” said Cinder sternly.

“Okay,” Spark replied.

“Now I think of it you lot should be having a nap by now,” Cinder added.

“All right,” groaned the cubs, as they slowly made their way to their nest and started to settle down.

“I want to have the pigeon feathers to sleep on,” yelped Burning Branch.

“No, I want them. It’s my turn,” Lava shot back.

“Well, what about me. I haven’t had them for days,” whined Ash. Suddenly a grey-brown flash crossed her vision as Fire Flower shot between her arguing brothers. “How about I have it and you shut-up and go to sleep.” And with that Fire Flower flopped down on the feathers and refused to move.

“Fine,” they grumbled as they climbed in. Spark jumped in and snuggled up next to her sister. As she closed her eyes, she thought of how lucky she was to have such great siblings.

Spark was woken suddenly by a loud howl. She recognised it as the voice of Forest Fire, the Alpha. Her movement disturbed her littermates.

“Everyone, wake up. Quickly,” she whispered. “I think something’s happening outside. Let’s check it out.”

Cinder had not yet woken and Spark could see her sides rise and fall steadily, so she knew it was a good time to sneak out from the nursing den.

Fire Flower groaned. Hauling herself to her paws, she yawned. “Is it morning already?”

Going Forth 125

“No, not yet. But something must be happening,” Spark replied urgently. “Everyone, follow me. Quietly.”

“Okay Spitfire. Hey guys, come over here. We can look outside now.”

As Spark reached the entrance of the den, Spitfire, a large male wolf, suddenly appeared.

“Yay,” Ash called back.

“What are you four doing out of bed?” he asked gruffly.

“We just wanted to know what was going on,” Ash whimpered.

“Well, this does not concern you.”

“Is Dark Pack attacking?” Spark asked.

“Be quiet, Spark!” Fire Flower said. “You shouldn’t be asking questions. We’re not supposed to know.”

“It’s going to be all right little ones,” Spitfire reassured them.

“But what is really happening?” Spark could not contain her curiosity.

Spitfire growled softly and Spark knew he was annoyed.

“You were right, little one,” he confessed. “Dark Pack is attacking but we will hold them off… You are safe. Now put your tails where your mouth is and get back to bed.” As he turned he whisked his tail and sat down to guard the entrance to the nursing den.

When the cubs got back to the nest, Cinder had woken up.

“What have you five been up to?” she asked.

“Nothing,” Spark answered, widening her eyes innocently.

But Lava could not contain himself. “We nearly escaped the den and… and… and Dark Pack’s attacking and… and… and Spitfire’s here to guard us and… and we nearly escaped the den!”

“Finally,” said Burning Branch.

As they looked out upon the battle they could see blood and fur strewn all over the ground. Wolves were panting, with gashes down their sides. Although there were many wolves there, Spark didn’t recognise any black pelts.

I wonder where Dark Pack has gone, Spark thought. They heard paw steps coming from the left. Spark whirled around and saw Forest Fire making her way up the winding path towards the nursing den. “We won,” she said grimly, “But we have lost brave old Ash Leaf.” Sorrow twisted her gaze as she informed Spitfire of the tragedy.

“Blaze, Flame and Fire Tree are badly wounded,” she added.

“We were lucky this time in being able to defend ourselves against Dark Pack.” She shook her head. “But I’m not sure if we’ll be so lucky next time.” Her faint whimper scared Spark. When Forest Fire was scared, it was definitely bad.

Forest Fire looked at the cubs. “Come,” she said, “It is time for you to meet the rest of the pack.”

The path was so windy that at some points they could hardly walk due to boulders sticking out of the ground.

When they finally got there Spark looked around, but what she saw was not what she had imagined. Like the battlefield, blood and fur was clumped everywhere, and the dens didn’t look much better.

Cinder growled. “You shouldn’t have been anywhere near the entrance.”

Spark looked upon Ash Leaf who was lying in the middle of the camp, and could smell the rank scent of death.

She could see Flame lying in the clearing next to Bright Spark, his mate, and she wondered how much longer he would live. Even from where she stood she could see deep gashes along his side and his right ear was shredded. Fire Blaze and Flame Ear were collecting water for the injured wolves.

“We’re sorry,” the cubs chorused, casting their eyes down.

“Hello,” Spark called.

“And right you should be,” Cinder’s voice was stern but Spark could see a glimmer of amusement in her eyes.

Cinder stood and shook out her pelt. “Stay here. I’m going to go see what’s happening.”

“Hi.” Fire Blaze called back gravely. “ It was a horrible battle, little one.”

Spark shot him an annoyed glance. He always says too much, she thought.

The cubs got into the nest but couldn’t go back to sleep.

Not now. They could hear the battle raging outside and curiosity crawled over them. Spark got up and wandered over to Spitfire. “Could we look out of the den?” Spark asked.

“As long as you don’t even put a paw outside,” Spitfire replied.

“I know,” Spark replied. She watched the exhausted shewolves walk away then scampered to catch up to Cinder and her littermates. As she fell into step with Fire Flower, she thought that if she had been in the battle she would have shredded that Dark Pack…

126

44th Apollo Bay Art Show Each day artists paint, sculpt, print, weave and express themselves with their hands and eyes. These moments of creation are often private; they may be powerful, peaceful, or simply practical. A professional doing their work.

The second step in the life of art is sharing. Artists, even the most reclusive, must set loose their finished works into their culture. Art shows, galleries, private showings, Instagram and Facebook all play a part in this sharing.

This disease that has swept through our world has changed so much in such a short time. For some artists, there has been more time and, in many instances, enforced isolation. For some, this has provided disciplined time to focus on producing work. A victim of this ill wind, though, was the closure of many of those avenues for sharing art.

We have adjusted as best we could, as we investigate ways to reclaim human connection, sharing artist endeavour without allowing the pandemic to spread.

In this often rational world, a work of art is a piece of magic.... this is the gift that artists share with any who are willing.

For 43 years, the Apollo Bay Art Show has taken place every year in our Summer holidays, opening around Boxing Day and extending into the New Year. This year, though, we have been set back. It has been a shock.

We have had to plan carefully and there has been many conversations to come to a resolve.

There was a 44th Apollo Bay Art Show. Beginning April 2, Good Friday 2021. It ran for 9 days closing Saturday the 10th of April 2021. We installed our physical exhibition in the Senior Citizens Hall, at 4 Whelan St, Apollo Bay. Three months later than tradition, and there was still the feeling that a new, necessary lock-down might seal the doors before they could open. So, we online went as well.

We expanded our website to put the entire show online.

No matter where you were for Easter 2021 you can visit the online gallery to see the excellent art. Were you at our show, one of the many people who support our show every year might stand next to you and pass on some stories of various works. Our community loves to tell you the personal story behind the creations. This is the challenge sharing online, it’s slightly less personal. Please remember that these virtual walls hold hours, even days of passion and skill, and there is a story behind each finished piece. If there is no one able to stand by and tell you the story, you might have to imagine it. apollobayartshow.com

Going Forth 127

Banksia In White - Mixed Media 60 × 60cm. Jo Bettiol 2020

Floe - Fused Glass 30 × 23cm. Terese Panczel 2020

Harvest Basket - Mixed Media 20×20cm. Lyndi Whalen 2021

Alien - Steampunk 32 × 30 cm Shane O’Carroll 2018

Bright Day At Marengo – Oil 21.5 × 16.8 Cm. Sarah Anthony 2021

Autumn Landscape - Acrylic 30 × 40cm. Elizabeth Mendoza 2019

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Books to Challenge, Inspire, Nourish and Soothe Nettie Hulme

Going Forth 129

Copy

On Connection

by Kae Tempest Publisher Faber & Faber 17 Nov 2020 Beneath the surface we are all connected . . .

‘An authentically soothing, powerful, thought provoker.’

Matt Haig

“On Connection is soul work ...

The truth-speaker Kae Tempest takes to non-fiction with grace, musicality and innate essayistic skill. The book glows with their trademark honesty and questing integrity. On Connection is medicine for these wounded times.”

Max Porter “On Connection came to me when I needed it most, and reminded me that the links we have to places, people, words, ourselves, are what keep us alive” Candice Carty-Williams

If Women Rose Rooted A life-changing journey to authenticity and belonging

by Sharon Blackie A life-changing journey from the wasteland of modern society to a place of nourishment and connection.

If Women Rose Rooted has been described as both transformative and essential. Sharon Blackie leads the reader on a quest to find their place in the world, drawing inspiration from the wise and powerful females in native mythology, and guidance from contemporary women who have re-rooted themselves in land and community and taken responsibility for shaping the

Drawing on twenty years’ experience as a writer and performer, award-winning poet, rapper and storyteller Kae Tempest explores how and why creativity - however we choose to practise it - can cultivate greater selfawareness and help us establish a deeper relationship to ourselves and the world.

Personal, hopeful and written with piercing clarity, On Connection is a meditation on creative connection and call to arms that speaks to a universal yet intimate truth “A precious small book with a huge punch right at the heart of the problems of today.”

Cosey Fanni Tutti Kae Tempest is an award-winning, Sunday Timesbestselling author, poet and recording artist. Tempest won the 2013 Ted Hughes Award, was nominated for a Costa Book Award and a BRIT Award, has been shortlisted for the Mercury Prize twice and was nominated for two Ivor Novello Awards. They were also named a Next Generation Poet by the Poetry Book Society, a decennial accolade. They released their fourth studio album, The Book of Traps and Lessons, in 2019, produced by Rick Rubin. Tempest grew up in South-East London, where they still live today. @kaetempest

future. Beautifully written, honest and moving, If Women Rose Rooted is a passionate song to a different kind of femininity, a rallying cry for women to reawaken their natural power - not just for the sake of their own wellbeing, but for love of this threatened earth.

Industry Reviews ‘Mind-blowing. An anthem for all we could be . . . I sincerely hope every woman who can read has the time and space to read it.’ Manda Scott | ‘Powerful and inspiring.’ Melissa Harrison | ‘A beautiful, intelligent and unusual book... I’m hoping this book will become the anthem of our generation.’

Kate Forsyth | ‘It is heartening to read a progressive view of the women’s movement and one that links with care for the Earth and all living beings. This book is very well recommended.’

GreenSpirit

130 Books to Challenge, Inspire, Nourish and Soothe Phosphorescence On Awe, Wonder And Things That Sustain You When The World Goes Dark

by Julia Baird Phosphorescence, by the always wonderful Julia Baird, is a masterful mix of science and psychology journalism, personal development book and memoir. Although I’ve found it difficult to describe to friends at times, it is not at all a difficult read.

The book takes as its jumping off point the idea that the very human experience of awe and wonder is good for you – good for your health, general wellbeing, ethics, and your spirit too. I’m not usually one for anything even mildly woo woo so I was grateful for the practical, no-nonsense diversions into solid pop science territory, where Dr Baird meanders delightfully through study after study backing up her points.

This isn’t to say that the writing is in any way workmanlike or sterile. The prose can even be quite lyrical, not shying

Bruny 2020 ABIA General Fiction Book of the Year

by Heather Rose The brilliant and explosive new novel from the author of the award-winning The Museum of Modern Love.

How far would your government go?

A right-wing US president has withdrawn America from the Middle East and the UN. Daesh has a thoroughfare to the sea and China is Australia’s newest ally. When a bomb goes off in remote Tasmania, Astrid Coleman agrees to return home to help her brother before an upcoming election. But this is no simple task. Her brother

away from describing anything from the beauty of a sunrise (“In Australia, the dawn is an arsonist who pours petrol along the horizon, throws a match on it and watches it burn”) to medical trauma (“those millions of us with cracked hearts, battered bodies, blackened brains”).

The book is, in some ways, a reaction to Dr Baird’s own medical ordeal. After being diagnosed with cancer several years ago, she has gone through a number of extremely traumatic surgeries to remove a tumour that ended up being the size of a basketball lodged in her abdomen.

One gets the impression that this experience turned the author into a philosopher – and not in a bad way. At times the book seems to be trying desperately to communicate greater wisdom to the next generation (two chapters are addressed directly to her two children). It wasn’t a surprise to learn that she wrote parts of the book between surgeries and while recovering from her last, without knowing for sure whether she would recover.

Phosphorescence is a surprise and a delight wrapped in a frankly gorgeous cover, and I’d have no hesitation in recommending it to virtually anyone. However, if you liked First, We Make the Beast Beautiful by Sarah Wilson or Any Ordinary Day by Leigh Sales then this book will find a special place on your bookshelf (and in your mind) for years to come.

and sister are on either side of politics, the community is full of conspiracy theories, and her father is quoting Shakespeare. Only on Bruny does the world seem sane.

Until Astrid discovers how far the government is willing to go.

Bruny is a searing, subversive, brilliant novel about family, love, loyalty and the new world order.

About the Author Heather Rose is the Australian author of eight novels. Her seventh novel The Museum of Modern Love won the 2017 Stella Prize. It also won the 2017 Christina Stead Prize and the 2017 Margaret Scott Prize. It has been published internationally and translated into numerous languages.

Both The Museum of Modern Love and The Butterfly Man were longlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award. The Butterfly Man won the Davitt Award in 2006, and in 2007 The River Wife won the international Varuna Eleanor Dark Fellowship.

Heather writes with Danielle Wood under the pen-name Angelica Banks and their Tuesday McGillycuddy children’s series has twice been shortlisted for the Aurealis Awards for best children’s fantasy. Angelica Banks is also published internationally. Heather lives by the sea in Tasmania.

Going Forth 131 This One Wild And Precious Life: A Hopeful Path Forward In A Fractured World

by Sarah Wilson Will you sleep through the revolution? Or do you want to wake up and reclaim your one wild and precious life?

We live in truly overwhelming times. The climate crisis, political polarisation, racial injustice and coronavirus have left many of us in a state of spiritual PTSD. We have retreated, morally and psychologically; we are experiencing a crisis of disconnection - from one another, from our true values, from joy, and from life as we feel we are meant to be living it.

Sarah Wilson argues that this sense of despair and disconnection is ironically what unites us - that deep down, we are all feeling that same itch for a new way of living. this one wild and precious life opens our eyes to how we got here and offers a radically hopeful path forward. Drawing on science, literature, philosophy, the wisdom of some of the world’s leading experts, and her personal journey, Wilson weaves a one-of-a-kind narrative that lights the way back to the life we love. En route, she leads us through a series of ‘wildly awake’ and joyful practices for reconnecting again that include: - Go to your edge. Do what scares you and embrace discomfort daily. Use it to grow into your Big Life.

- #buylesslivemore. Break the cycle of mindless consumption and get light with your life.

Foxfire, Wolfskin : and Other Stories of Shapeshifting Women

by Sharon Blackie A book for all the wild women ...

Foxfire, Wolfskin is simply the most perfect thing. I love each and every placement of each word. Love the wildness, the shapeshifting, the fearsomeness of it.’ Jackie Morris, co-author of The Lost Words ‘She lived fully, my fox, and I envied her with all my heart.

I wanted to dance with her, sister or lover, across the snow-clad vastness of this land. Together, we’d create the Northern Lights. For that is what foxes do – racing over the fells, whipping up the snow with their tails, the friction of it sending up sparks into the midnight sky. This is what makes the aurora’s glow. Revontulet, we call it: foxfire.’

Charged with drama and beauty, this memorable collection by a master storyteller weaves a magical world of possibility and power from female myths of physical renewal, creation and change. It is an extraordinary immersion into the

- Become a soul nerd. Embrace poetry, deep reading, art, and classical music to light up your intellect.

- Get ‘full-fat spiritual’. How to have an active practice beyond the ‘lite’ ‘rainbows and unicorns’ - and use it to change the world.

- Hike. Just hike. Walking in nature reconnects us with ourselves, and with our true purpose.

- Practise wild activism. If you can get 3.5 per cent of a population to participate in sustained, non-violent protest, change happens. We create our better world.

The time has come to boldly, wildly, imagine better. We are being called upon, individually and as a society, to forge a new path and to find a new way of living. Will you join the journey?

Author information Sarah Wilson is the author of the New York Times bestsellers first, we make the beast beautiful: a new story about anxiety, which Mark Manson described as ‘the best book on living with anxiety that I’ve ever read’, and I Quit Sugar, along with eleven cookbooks that have been published in fiftytwo countries.

Previously, she was editor of Cosmopolitan Australia, host of MasterChef Australia and founder of iquitsugar.com, an 8-week program that has seen millions worldwide break their sugar addiction. In May 2018, Sarah committed to giving all proceeds from the business to charity. She now builds and enables charity projects that engage humans with one another, and campaigns on mental health, consumerism, racial injustice, and climate issues. Sarah lives in Sydney, is an obsessive hiker and spent eight years travelling the world with one bag. bodies and voices, mindscapes and landscapes, of the shapeshifting women of our native folklore.

Drawing on myth and fairy tales found across Europe from Croatia to Sweden, Ireland to Russia, these stories are about coming to terms with our animal natures, exploring the ways in which we might renegotiate our fractured relationship with the natural world, and uncovering the wildness and wilderness within.

Beautifully illustrated by Helen Nicholson, Foxfire, Wolfskin and Other Stories of Shapeshifting Women is Blackie’s first collection of short stories.

‘Sharon Blackie has wrought a new-old magic for our times: glorious, beautiful, passionate myths. They show who we could have been, and they give us a glimpse of a world-thatcould-be.’

Manda Scott, author of A Treachery of Spies and Boudica ‘A deeply evocative and haunting collection... Part rally cry, part warning, part manifesto and all parts enchanting, Sharon Blackie’s Foxfire, Wolfskin is a deeply evocative and haunting collection. I want to press this powerful book into the hands of everyone I know and say listen.’

Holly Ringland, author of The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart

132 Books to Challenge, Inspire, Nourish and Soothe Where the Crawdads Sing By: Delia Owens When I bought this book, I had no idea how much it would transport me to the marsh of North Carolina. Kya’s interaction with nature and the story of her life unfold with intricate beauty, brokenness, survival, and empathy. Kya’s interactions and appreciation with mother earth made me miss home (being a American). While traveling into the city by train, I was transported to a different place. Kya is a complex, beautiful, clever, and endearing character that I found myself wanting to invest time in, and wanting her to have a happy ending. No spoilers here, but the book keeps you guessing and leaves you with the benefit of giving others a chance.

Review submitted by Heidi Hulme For years, rumors of the “Marsh Girl” have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the

The Living Mountain A Celebration of the Cairngorm Mountains of Scotland

by Nan Shepherd Celebrating some of the most original works in recent years, The Canons are titles of enduring quality and importance that will challenge, inspire and be enjoyed by readers in generations to come.

In this masterpiece of nature writing, Nan Shepherd describes her journeys into the Cairngorm mountains of Scotland. There she encounters a world that can be breathtakingly beautiful at times and shockingly harsh at others. Her intense, poetic prose explores and records the rocks, rivers, creatures and hidden aspects of this remarkable landscape.

locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand.

Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life - until the unthinkable happens.

Perfect for fans of Barbara Kingsolver and Celeste Ng, Where the Crawdads Sing is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.

About the Author Delia Owens is the co-author of three internationally bestselling nonfiction books about her life as a wildlife scientist in Africa including Cry of the Kalahari. She has won the John Burroughs Award for Nature Writing and has been published in Nature, The African Journal of Ecology, and many others. She currently lives in Idaho. Where the Crawdads Sing is her first novel.

Shepherd spent a lifetime in search of the ‘essential nature’ of the Cairngorms; her quest led her to write this classic meditation on the magnificence of mountains, and on our imaginative relationship with the wild world around us.

Composed during the Second World War, the manuscript of The Living Mountain lay untouched for more than thirty before it was finally published.

About the Author Anna (Nan) Shepherd was born in 1893 and died in 1981.

Closely attached to Aberdeen and her native Deeside, she graduated from her home university in 1951 and for the next forty-one years worked as a lecturer in English.

An enthusiastic gardener and hill-walker, she made many visits to the Cairngorms with students and friends.

Industry Reviews * The finest book ever written on nature and landscape in Britain Guardian * Most works of mountain literature are written by men, and most of them focus on the goal of the summit. Nan Shepherd’s aimless, sensual exploration of the Cairngorms is bracingly different -- Robert Macfarlane

Going Forth 133 Active Hope

Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine.

By Joanna Macy & Chris Johnstone

At the heart of this book is the idea that Active Hope is something we do rather than have. It involves being clear what we hope for and then playing our role in the process of bringing that about. The journey of finding, and offering, our unique contribution to the Great Turning helps us to discover new strengths, open to a wider network of allies and experience a deepening of our aliveness. When our responses are guided by the intention to act for the healing of our world, the mess we’re in not only becomes easier to face, our lives also become more meaningful and satisfying.

Active Hope is about finding, and offering, our best response to the crisis of sustainability unfolding in our world. It offers tools that help us face the mess we’re in, as well as find and play our role in the collective transition, or Great Turning, to a life-sustaining society.

“Books about social and ecological change too often leave out a vital component: how do we change ourselves so that we are strong enough to fully contribute to this great shift?

Active Hope fills this gap beautifully, guiding readers on a journey of gratitude, grief, interconnection and, ultimately, transformation.”

The book guides the reader through a transformational process informed by mythic journeys, modern psychology, spirituality and holistic science. This process equips us with tools to face the mess we’re in and play our role in the collective transition, or Great Turning, towards a lifesustaining society.

134 Books to Challenge, Inspire, Nourish and Soothe

Tjanimaku Tjukurpa: how one young man came good Book Review by Melissa Lindeman Ngaanyatjarra Pitjantjartjara Yankunytjatjara (NPY) Women’s Council, Alice Springs A children’s book seems an unlikely outcome of a men’s group established to talk about violence and its impacts. Published by the Ngaanyatjarra Pitjantjartjara Yankunytjatjara (NPY) Women’s Council in Central Australia, Tjanimaku Tjukurpa: how one young man came good1, tells the story of Tjanima, a boy who grows into an angry young man.

Although written for young Anangu2 (10+), their families and communities, it can be for “anyone seeking to better understand mental health, trauma and healing”.

The book is set in the NPY lands, the tri-state border region of region of South Australia, Northern Territory and Western Australia, an area larger than the state of Victoria and roughly the size of Germany. Around 6,000 Anangu live in 26 communities throughout the region, still speaking their traditional languages. The book is published in two of these (Pitjantjatjara and Ngaanyatjarra) with the English translation on each page of both versions.

in the world of alcohol, family violence and unsupported pregnancy. Tjulpu and Walpa stemmed from the work of a senior group of women who had been meeting for several years learning about mental health issues. They wanted to offer an alternative to the trajectory that had seemed almost inevitable for many of their young people.

The women thought men should have the same chance to learn about trauma and healing: Elders and traditional healers (Ngangkari4) working alongside a group of Western health professionals to develop a shared language and understanding for discussing these difficult concepts.

The women advocated for the establishment of the men’s group, as they could see the benefits if senior men had the same opportunity5.

There are other outcomes from both the women’s and men’s groups, but these children’s books provide an accessible ‘way in’ to understanding something of Anangu life, as well as offering a glimpse into the remarkable work these senior Anangu are doing for their communities. They are also beautifully presented and a real pleasure to own, and purchase supports the important work of the NPY Women’s Council.

The book is beautifully illustrated by Jan Bauer, and documents a story developed by almost 20 Anangu men during a series of workshops. The story is told simply, from the point of view of Tjanima’s grandfather, who knows both the sorrows and hardships faced by his family and community and the joys and deep meaning from a sense of belonging to his traditional culture.

It conveys hope, while also providing a window into the complexities and difficulties facing Anangu living in remote communities.

The book follows the 2017 publication of Tjulpu and Walpa3 the story of two girls, one who has a good life supported by family and culture, and the other who is lost 1 https://www.npywc.org.au/product/tjanimaku-tjukurpa/ 2 People from the NPY region.

3 Published by NPY Women’s Council, Alice Springs, 2017. https://www.npywc.org.au/product/tjulpu-and-walpa-two-children-two-roads/ 4 More information about the work of Ngangkaris can be found at: https://www.npywc.org.au/what-we-do/ngangkari-traditional-healers/ 5 Kim Mahood wrote about the beginnings of this men’s group and their journey, similar to a group of senior women who had already been meeting for several years learning about mental health issues. The Monthly, At the edge of comprehension (Dec 2018-Jan 2019) https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2018/december/1543582800/kim-mahood/edge-comprehension#mtr

Going Forth 135

Active Hope Joanna Macy Active Hope is not wishful thinking.

Active Hope is not waiting to be rescued by some savior.

Active Hope is waking up to the beauty of life on whose behalf we can act.

We belong to this world.

The web of life is calling us forth at this time.

We’ve come a long way and are here to play our part.

With Active Hope we realize that there are adventures in store, strengths to discover, and comrades to link arms with.

Active Hope is a readiness to discover the strengths in ourselves and in others; a readiness to discover the reasons for hope and the occasions for love.

A readiness to discover the size and strength of our hearts, our quickness of mind, our steadiness of purpose, our own authority, our love for life, the liveliness of our curiosity, the unsuspected deep well of patience and diligence, the keenness of our senses, and our capacity to lead.

None of these can be discovered in an armchair or without risk.

136

A Vision

by Wendell Berry If we will have the wisdom to survive, to stand like slow-growing trees on a ruined place, renewing, enriching it, if we will make our seasons welcome here, asking not too much of earth or heaven, then a long time after we are dead the lives our lives prepare will live there, their houses strongly placed upon the valley sides, fields and gardens rich in the windows. The river will run clear, as we will never know it, and over it, birdsong like a canopy.

On the levels of the hills will be green meadows, stock bells in noon shade.

On the steeps where greed and ignorance cut down the old forest, an old forest will stand, its rich leaf-fall drifting on its roots.

The veins of forgotten springs will have opened.

Families will be singing in the fields.

In their voices they will hear a music risen out of the ground. They will take nothing from the ground they will not return, whatever the grief at parting. Memory, native to this valley, will spread over it like a grove, and memory will grow into legend, legend into song, song into sacrament. The abundance of this place, the songs of its people and its birds, will be health and wisdom and indwelling light. This is no paradisal dream.

Its hardship is its possibility.