Peter Dawncy
Peter Dawncy lives in the Dandenong Ranges east of Melbourne. He has an Arts Degree with majors in English and Philosophy from Monash University and is currently completing Honours in poetry writing. For his thesis, Peter is undertaking a study of Philip Hammial’s poetry through Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari. He hopes to begin his PhD next year. Peter has had poetry and fiction published in various Australian journals and magazines, and in 2010 he was the winner of the Monash Poetry Prize and came second in the Monash fiction-writing competition. His play, The Logue of Thomas P. T. Lawrence, was performed at the Arts Centre in June 2010.
logue
satellites coalesce / fold
the corners to the
belt above
triangles as
squid jigs
at the jetty’s end
in fluorescence by
the dried
white-bait clumps
snapper catch
gloves welcome
container ships with
coordinates
for salt meets sky
Melbourne woven in it
Eureka deep green
iceberg siege
seen from afar
by the
research vessel en route
to the Antarctic snowfields
saturnine
darkness
over floodwater
extends
smooth, wet pavement
over stars
murmur
as monkeys march
to flightless geese
flapping.
pour further
wide and windless
a fleece
bobs by
saturnine
fishermen
hauling in mulloway—
take
a picture
and somewhere
a frame discards
its portrait
and searches for a
foreign landscape.
for now, moonlight
skewers a dog’s nose,
bogong moths whirl,
a shadow
opens the door, sneezes,
closes the door—
tap shoes
seem too polished
for a winter worn
underwater.
autumn storm
spiralling tongues
twirl, slash the billowing
gun-powder grit
beneath the blue gum and
above the clamouring
bracken. milk thistles levelled
as dogwoods sneeze, black-
birds dive for the pine copse
and ferns puff dust
from their beards as
they lean and squint. a black-
wood teeters and quakes,
topples as its feet rent
the earth
like a child shredding
wrapping paper. somewhere
in the composting depths
a little girl in a green
and white dress
gets her hair caught
and screams for her mother.