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From: Vol.07 N.02 – Writing in the Pause

Nest

by Robyn Maree Pickens

What did you learn? (Avoid singular first-person pronouns)

        How to tack cardboard to the bottom of doors to prevent draught

Was the ocean in the distance?

  Folded-up chicken wire can be inserted between gutter and roofing iron to prevent rodents

Did you experience fragmentation?

   Use a tarp to drag a heavy piece of furniture from the basement up a narrow path to your study

Which muscle group did you use?

 The fear was always that it would spread to the refugee camps

Were you scorched?

What can [ ] ask of the other?

Did you exist between carrying and being carried?

 In the beginning it felt unsafe to touch ferns on neighbourhood walks

Was there an alignment between inner and outer layers?

 The yellow of the sun intensified the yellow of the leaves

Did you cut your hair?

Yes, but this is normal

Would you like to add anything?

A mouse had ossified in the hot water cupboard

Published: October 2020
Robyn Maree Pickens

is an art writer, poet, and a critical/creative PhD candidate in ecological aesthetics at the University of Otago, Aotearoa/New Zealand. Her poetry has appeared in Empty MirrorInto the VoidPeach Mag, SAND Berlin, amberflora, CorditePlumwood MountainMatador Review, Jacket 2, at ARTSPACE, Auckland, and in the Brotherton Poetry Prize Anthology published by Carcanet Press, and in Fractured Ecologies.

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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