The Bush Angel

bella : It’s okay. I’ve got you.

THE CAMERA SITS AT BIRD’S EYE VIEW, showing RICKY and BELLA flying above rolling green mountains.

bella : Look Ricky, see that mountain over there?

r iCk Y: Woah! That’s even bigger than my old foster dad!

bella : Well, sometimes, people will say ‘I’ve got a mountain of work to do ’, but as an expression. They don’t mean a real mountain, because that would be crazy! They just say to make the point that there’s a lotta work to do. Ya get it?

Ricky thinks to himself.

r iCk Y: Ohhh, so, if I say, ‘my brain is smaller than an ant’, is that a metaphor?

bella : Exactly!

r iCk Y: I’ve missed you, Bella.

bella : I’ve missed you too, buddy.

BELLA dips her body to her side, intending to make a small turn in the air. As she tilts downwards, we see RICKY’s red hottie slip out of his jacket pocket. The hottie falls in mid-air for hundreds of metres, before plunging into a lake below. RICKY leans over to watch it fall.

RiCk Y: NOOOOOOOOOOO! DANG! Bella, my hottie’s gone!

bella : Oh no, I’m sorry buddy. [Pause] You know what? I’m gonna get it back for you… bella : Hold on tight Ricky, I’m going in.

THE CAMERA FOLLOWS THE BOTTLE as it slowly descends into the lake below. As BELLA swoops down, intending to reach the lake’s surface and collect it. There’s an increase in her speed.

BELLA moves very fast now. The CAMERA CATCHES HER FROM A BIRD’S EYE VIEW, AND THEN CLOSES UP ON HER FACE , which is determined. RICKY is struggling to maintain his grip. We then see RICKY’s hands slip down the length of her wings, until he is hanging from the bottom of her right wing with only one hand. r iCk Y: (SCREAMS) AAAAAAAAAH! BELLA! BELLA HELP ME! bella : (SCREAMS) RICKY! RICKY! NOOOOOOOOO!

BELLA looks to her right and her eyes widen. Before she can blink, RICKY’s hand loses its grip and he falls.

THE CAMERA SWITCHES FROM BELLA TO RICKY, PANNING DOWNWARD IN FRONT OF HIS BODY AS HE FALLS. Suddenly, there is a splash as we see RICKY drop in through the cold lake’s surface. THE CAMERA IS NOW PLACED DEEP UNDER WATER AT WORM’S EYE VIEW. In slow motion we see RICKY’s body sink deeper and deeper, closer and closer toward the camera. Eventually, RICKY opens his eyes and swims back up to the light. His head reaches the surface and… r iCk Y: What…? (Whispers) BELLA? (Screams) BELLA? r iCk Y: BELLA? ……PLEASE! [pause]

THE CAMERA CUTS TO RICKY SITTING ON A BED, where he is currently living. He is still splashing .., but instead his arm hits the thin air. He scans the room hopelessly, searching for a sign of the bush.

[Pause] BELLA?

(RICKY stands up frantically and continues to call for Bella.)

(…Whispers) I love you Bella.

Feeling feeble and forlorn, RICKY slips back into bed and curls up there. Tears fill his eyes. Suddenly, he feels something under his back. RICKY pushes his covers aside, and finds his hottie laying there. RICKY holds it, feeling its warmth, and begins to weep.

End Scene ‘

Claudia Carter

They call me vain. But what is vanity by any other name, A curse, an obsession yet I’m to blame, Even as they shoved the apple down my throat, Used their weapon of words, I fought in vain, Put up my shields, despite the strain, A worthy battle, I could not sustain, I asked, no longer could I refrain, Mirror, mirror on the wall, Who’s the fairest of them all?

Look at me on the wall, try not to cry or bawl, How could you be fairest of them all? Don’t you see the girls on your phone, All of them are skin and bone, Perfect, pedestalled, phantoms. Not like you all alone, Sitting so sad in your home, You see the girls on your screen, Beautiful, barren, berated. Don’t look at yourself, you might scream.

I found a new weapon, learned to paint my face my eyes, lips and cheeks, I complete my doll face. I hold my double-edged sword as they call me conceited, But one too many times I have conceded; Changing myself to reach your sun, Only to burn, how far I’ve come. You can call me lovely or ugly or vain, In your misconceiving mind I will wane, Rot and decay. Yet still I remain. Now in my prime, you watch, we wait.

I find myself quietly standing In a corner of a room

Shouting boys and men surrounding While I stay silent in the gloom

‘Come here, come sit with me’

A hand grabs my waist, please, can he not?

‘You’ve got a pretty face, a pretty body too’ Stop saying those things, stop

‘Don’t speak your mind’ But I have things to say?

‘Guys don’t like that’

Enough with the cliché?

‘What was she wearing?’

‘Who was she with?’

‘Did she even try to stop it?’

‘Why did she drink if she didn’t want to give?’

The room begins to shrink, My low-cut shirt wasn’t an invitation. I don’t like your hands on my body. Get them off, for your information.

Charlotte nheu

She is the harmony: The helper of daisies, The killer of creepers, A planter for comfort. A seed to grow lovely.

She is the compelling: That flickering firewood, That riveting ruin, A sweeting to harbour. A bud to shed shelling.

She is the ethereal: More beauty than Venus, More life than a plaything, A heavenly carcass. A sprout to defy soil.

She is the ecstasy: The darkening of trust, The sunshine of desire, A radiant bullet. An ensnaring holly.

She is the calamity: Something for me to feast, Something for me to yearn, A desire to slay for. A thorn to prick deadly.

She is the absolute: That light in the storm, That murderous beacon, A thunderous beauty. Crimson, but darker.

She is mine: Mine to nurture lifeless, Mine to cherish deathless.

She is mine, Amongst my other flora.

Herself

SundaY WilliamS Starkie

And I’ll kill without hesitation

I won’t entertain this petty conversation I’ll kill it and I won’t feel sorry.

I have no empathy for the people who pick us apart Teeth puncture wounds in the fibres of my heart I will not sit and smile at those who Take the suffering I scream as food I will cut and I will slice, and I will Tear off every writing limb, I’ll kill The patience that here festers and seethes, The expectation of the person you think I should be, This rotten, mouldering, swollen heap Lies in my throat, and it’s angry.

Not prettily tied up by some infected anxiety, Not poetically worded by intellectual sobriety, Not furious, not seething. Pissed off that I have to keep repeating Myself again, but louder Meaner, a delicate white flower Turned rotten and foul, Its slender head turned to the ground, The light shining over its twisted carcass Painting it by its shades of darkness. By its flaws and its failures, This pretty little thing This tiny inconsequential thing on the floor.

This tiny thing that dared wish for more, This tiny speck of insolence, this poor Sweet crystal shattered into pieces, ‘This isn’t you, you’ve been defeated!’ All because I didn’t allow myself to be.

I am not sad. I was not sad. I will not be sad , Dainty thing, head full of clouds Submission parcelled out, endowed Outwards. Because the world wants another submission, A sacrifice, not senseless rebellion

I am pissed off and I am right I will be until my crows take flight I will be angry until I can’t feel anymore And I’m a twisted carcass with nothing more Inside of it. Until then my blood will fizz And every nerve will writhe and twitch And I will hold my weapon

To the heart of this filth

Until it dies, And I die, And the planet slots into alignment, And I am pure again.