The most recent free verse poems by Mel Irvine.
Ignoring Safety Advice (10/4/2016) - in the beginning i remember thinking … i will never ever board one of those dodgy carnival rides circling fiestas their steel support posts levelled out on rocks and pieces of concrete rubble. but yeh, i did. and yeh, i do. you change your perspective ignoring safety advice you allow yourself to become, to be part […]
Death in the Open Grasslands (2/28/2015) - death comes as a shock startling and sudden my morose curiosity a sadness a lament for a lifeless form © 2015 Mel Irvine
Waiting for a Tide (4/25/2015) - vacant fishing boats and children’s voices call from somewhere inside. slow slow tide. ‘Filipino time’ admonishes grandmother (not for the last time) ‘no good’ 3 or 4 hours have trickled by while we wait and wait wait wait wait for a high tide to dislodge our transport we sit lunch stands tethered to a bamboo […]
Smile for a sack of rice (11/3/2015) - they know exactly why they are smiling why I was arriving at 10.30 in the morning why they had to put on pants and shoes eldest sister points her little brother to the camera light smile for a sack of rice starving mamma sold their blanket smile for a sack of rice “i know there […]
Echo (12/3/2016) - Sound travels differently under the water. The familiar becoming noise, or the nothing become sound. Under the water each breath becomes a bubble, strangely reverberating I am an echo. © 2016 Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Echo I shot this video at Wolf Rock off Rainbow Beach (Queensland) Australia in 2007. Wolf Rock is enclosed by a […]
A Weekend of Rest (1/20/2017) - a weekend of rest, (I’m still blogging though for fun) back in his country reunited us wandering the festive streets remembering us in bright streets transformed the Dinagyang aesthetic a weekend of rest © 2017 Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Aesthetic and Overworked
Decades (1/2/2017) - “your daughter has committed suicide” my brother-in-law said to my 80 year old father “and it’s your fault! tonight” after years of domestic abuse, violence and insults … he rang back of course, crazed, demanding, belittling, meek, puzzling, accusing. we rang the police of course. they were annoyed of course. she rang later of course. […]
New England Harvest (11/29/2016) - displaying all the Australian blues, greens and golds, I am home again. © 2016 Melinda Irvine
Early (5/19/2017) - light passing torn clouds palm leaf rags tattered hut poverty a man into rice fields out the window of the bus © 2017 Melinda J. Irvine Photo Challenge: Reflecting
Rice On the Road (8/30/2016) - We walk along wet roadside picturing the new sunlight on rice farms, fathers and hardwork. Barefeet turn drying rice as trucks beep confused alarm at the white woman and small brown boy out in unsheltered heat. Flood water rushes through our pictures, seeing all green and green and green until three heads stand staring (like the […]
Bad Me (3/3/2016) - bad me’ i heard his little voice say ‘bad me’ small head turned into the pillow ‘bad me’ i had scolded him for breaking a yellow colouring pencil he stomped it into two pieces discarded for garbage i found it in the dirt covered by grass nga (why)? i had asked him in the tricycle […]
Choices (12/16/2015) - who do you choose? gifted kids? poor families good grades always in school doctors dentists teachers ‘good’ boys always in school but what about other kids? poor families bad grades never in school laundry-work cleaners begging ‘bad’ girls never in school © 2015 Melinda Irvine It is easy to choose ‘good’ kids for sponsorship. To […]
One Sunset (1/14/2017) - She warms us, lights us. Of more is she capable, our centre, our sun. © 2017 Melinda J. Irvine Daily Prompt: Capable
Unmoored (5/22/2017) - adrift in the wash bucket he climbed my arm unmoored © 2017 Melinda J. Irvine Daily Post: Adrift and Unmoored
I Went Looking for Piglets: a One Versed Mystery (11/2/2016) - © 2016 Melinda Irvine My contribution to the Blogging-U course Photography: Developing Your Eye II (Day 2 Mystery).
Leaving the Temple (3/28/2017) - wreathed boy spoke limestone or held bird © 2017 Melinda J. Irvine Photo: Limestone statuette of a boy with a wreath of leaves
No Extra Charge for Ants (8/20/2016) - i know we think our medical system is flawed (most likely it is) BUT have you ever seen an australian baby in our hospitals fanned by an old piece of cardboard, their IV drip hung on a window latch, and ants crawling over their little body while their tired mum wonders how she will pay for […]
What I See (1/15/2017) - You see what I see. See my world in my poems. Though you, you are unseen. © 2017 Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Unseen
She Was Light (12/21/2016) - I saw a happiness in her, a change in fortune. Tiny pieces radiating colour from inside. And she again heard bird sounds and saw midday sunshine above trees. She felt something and believed again, she was light. © 2016 Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Fortune
Unknown Artists (6/15/2017) - city speaks her name lurid voices piss, the stained human shit a siren behind their streets his only triumph © 2017 Melinda J. Irvine Daily Post: Triumph I’m part of Post A Day 2017 This is my contribution for the Blogging-U course Photography: Developing Your Eye II (Day 10 Triumph).
The words I write hurt (4/29/2014) - sometimes the words i write on the page hurt too much and i cannot look at them then my hand cannot make a shape and i can’t feel anything at all have i written too much? will it just add increase to their pain; to their suffering but how can you write too much about this? sometimes […]
My Mother’s Garden (6/29/2016) - my mother’s garden is older than me in places (it has places) i have never stood or seen until now, remembering cedar trees (dad planted them when we were little) and weekends spent collecting bush seeds, saplings and native vines, repotted in the school holidays when the other kids in the street visited the city […]
Navigating the Backroads (10/28/2016) - home is a tangle of paperbarks home is dad’s buckled old ute full of brown dogs home is a black-sanded pathway past the swamp home is an osprey’s nest rebuilt again last year home is the sound of glossy blacks cracking she-oaks not far from the track home is a murky-green forestry dam where dad […]
Lemon Tree Flats (3/28/2015) - driving to the lemon tree flats i am a passenger for the first time in months (maybe longer) laughing more than my body can remember i sit in back while we stop for lizards lizards with beards and long tails (tails longer than our stories) sit inside shared binoculars. gravel dust already dry road covers […]
The Colours of Day (12/26/2016) - Wandering the last of the roses, her festive garden colours Christmas days in mountain blues, lilacs and the tiny shades of bees. © 2016 Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Festive
Into his direction (12/9/2015) - i saw a woman hurt today inside a crumble of people staring as a man and security guard grapple toward a woman LOUD and voices indiscernable security guard LOUDER as man rushes at her, young woman his hand raised, fist clenched white knuckles and elbow high only stopping suddenly before her face. and i stand […]
Final (5/14/2017) - There is a courage in final the last stroke the brush lain; there is a courage at final the full stop the send. There is a courage in final the last line the light turned the calling and ending the leaving you gone. © 2017 Melinda J. Irvine Daily Post: Final
The Monster You Created (12/13/2016) - A highway passed here once, doors widened to commerce and community. Time and highways flee these places remaining only at a distance (like the monster you created). © Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Flee
Laundry Soap (11/30/2015) - the Plaza Molo transformed. where is lawn grown green that seated last December? dead lifeless garden remnants “are you drawing church?” asks policeman, pointing to red notebook ‘no’ hear myself reply ‘writing it’ smiles approvingly denied rain centuried brick falling vine casacades past iron rusted peaks while sun scorched leaves dry season Mary sitting stained […]
Time (7/1/2016) - time passes slowly before me each particle every fragment finding its own place finding its own time floating alone not lonely © 2016 Melinda Irvine
Little Wizard (5/20/2017) - you replay crouching behind a tricycle and surprising me with your collected “love potion” swirling leaves and flowers and petals “you will fall in love tita mel!” you shouted showering me in your wish. then once more for you. © 2017 Melinda J. Irvine
Praying for a New Moon (2/1/2017) - This moon has a scent black and pungent a small crack surrounded in smoke. It slashes at your door when the lights are gone, and demands a daughter. She bargained herself for her small sister’s stead (did the little girl see what her sister did not?) while we’ve locked into ourselves. Some of us inside steel […]
Someday (1/13/2017) - We will watch the sunset painting names in bright colours (like a family). © 2017 Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Someday
I am ready to fly (4/5/2016) - i am ready to fly and the wind is with me … © 2016 Melinda Irvine The lovely painting was inside an old book called ‘Fairyland’ by Ida Rentoul Outhwaite. I found in the shearing shed at my grandmother’s farm when it was cleaned up for sale in 2014. The book was badly damaged and […]
Inside a Tree (8/22/2016) - i wish i could give you the beauty of this tree how (even in all this) rusted bars dirty glass framed with grime and plastic tubes roaring air-con dust clad window noise little pieces of wire strung bits of stuff tied around frayed man-made edges and old broken pipes, yet remains a life. half-way up […]
Christmas in Retreat (12/27/2016) - 3.30am neighbours finally silent, interstate plates homed. the street has wound down to wind and a few last lights: Christmas in retreat. © 2016 Melinda Irvine Daily Prompt: Retreat
A Simple Island Life (5/9/2017) - Each morning begins before the sun appears over the cliff raining daylight along the leeward living below our 21st century sun. Monkeys grab at fruit scraps (sometime pets) a few chickens and fecund dogs wander a small shore. Children squeal to the high tide where fathers disappear aft along the rough netted and roped they […]
Botanical gardens sprinkler (3/2/2015) - you 3am stalker thrusting your jets upon my wide open windows GO TO SLEEP! © 2015 Mel Irvine
