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From: Vol.05 N.01 – Stick in a Thumb and Pull out a Plum: Poetry and Comsumption

Chronicle of the Ongoing Ruins

by Peter Lach-Newinsky

After Basho. I’m against

reality

he replied

 

Inside Out. now kids have so many options

why would they ever go outside

 

Burnout. if we colonise other solar systems

we could survive longer than our sun

perhaps another 100 trillion years

when all stars begin burning out

 

Kant. she makes

the valid point

that it’s even harder

to become famous

for nothing

 

Girt. Australia abounds

with informed enthusiasts

who can replay

with commentary

the battles of Kapyong or Long Tan

 

Like. whenever she came over

she’d be like where are the cameras?

you guys are a reality show

 

Viral. was Sabrina Harman really smiling

over the dead body in Abu Ghraib

or was it a ‘just say cheese’ smile?

 

Good Riddance. what we conceive of

as ‘time’

might one day

disappear

 

Girt 2.  Australia is a breeding ground

for bikini-ready DJs

of, um, indeterminate talent

 

Intertext. one can only wonder

if the entire caboodle

of our universe is not

the outburst of some

gigantic extra-cosmic

writerly imagination

 

Adorno. how can we possibly be expected

to keep track of all these people

& their exact position on the spectrum

from ‘real’ to ‘celebrity’

 

Noumenon.  thousands of migratory birds

died after apparently mistaking

a car park & other areas

of southern Utah for water

 

Différence.  it also enables the person to believe

they are making a difference

reversing global warming

saving the whales when

all they are doing is

eating a salad sandwich

 

Eclipse.  where would Ray-Ban sunglasses

Kresta blinds Banana Boat &

the paintings of Claude Monet

be without sunlight

 

Outside In. now kids have so many options

why would they ever go outside

 

After Ikkyu. I’m against

reality

he replied

Published: January 2018
Peter Lach-Newinsky

Peter Lach-Newinsky’s three poetry books are Cut a Long Story Short (Puncher & Wattmann 2014), Requiem (Picaro Press New Work 2012) and The Post-Man Letters & Other Poems (Picaro Press New Work 2010). He has won the Varuna-Picaro Publishing Prize (2009), the Melbourne Poets Union International Poetry Prize (2009 and 2010), the Vera Newsom Poetry Prize (2012) and been runner-up in the Val Vallis Award and the Shoalhaven Poetry Award. He has been twice shortlisted for the Newcastle Prize. Peter lives with his wife Barbara in Bundanoon in the southern highlands of New South Wales. Their 20 acre working property is designed along permaculture lines and includes 120 heritage apple varieties.

An Australian and international
journal of ecopoetry and ecopoetics.

Plumwood Mountain Journal is created on the unceded lands of the Gadigal and Wangal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and to elders past, present and future. We also acknowledge all traditional custodians of the lands this journal reaches.

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