Competition

Third Prize

Dispossession
by Jack Burnham
Caloundra Christian College, Caloundra, Qld

The muddy, serpentine sprawl of river,
swelling, straining against its banks.
Breaching. Breaking. Breathing.

Cascading down potholed roads,
crashing against concrete gutters like knives. And faces
of brick; mottled and dead. Laughing.

Reaching the level, the city; the end.
Building up on itself, destroying all with itself.
Get washed away. Get soaked.

It’s soul destroying, this is. When
you have to bail yourself out
of what used to be your home: your own.

Evicted by the very substance
that keeps life ticking over.
But the slave that once served you so well, is now

what laps at your feet and
erodes your resolve.
A dirty brown revolution. Flooding

your mind. Warping lintel and
doorframes.  Blurring
the edges of photographs.

And even after the torrent
and fears have flowed away,
it remains, in soul and memory. Gnawing.

The walls of the past are now stained, and
silt from the river bed is settled and still
in the carpet. Squatting.

You can return, you can reside. You can even
hope and pray. But nothing can be the same again.
This is not your home. Not anymore.

Highly Commended

Death in the City-State
by Daena Ho
Bicton, Perth, WA

When I went to Singapore, first
thing I noticed hurrying
home from lunch to see the grandparents
were the Wakes

On the ground floor of the block of flats
where my grandparents lived,
plastic chairs sat scattered
awaiting the mourning

Yellowed sheets shielded
passersby from the open casket,
but not the incense
and musky melancholy

There were wreaths everywhere.
That evening coming home,
I saw family around wooden tables
folding ritual offerings

The photograph told me
he'd been a youngish man, late thirties, Chinese
I quickened my steps past
the intoning chants

I don't know what to feel
my laughter always died
as if my happiness should insult them,
belittle their sorrow

Grief startles me when it isn't tucked
into green cemeteries or white funeral parlours
Here amongst the routine and commonplace,
death seems mundane

The last time, leaving for Perth, I kept
my steps quick and head low
but I knew the scent of grief
wilting in the heat