Live Encounters Poetry & Writing 16th Anniversary Volume Six
November- December 2025
Leaf Angels, poems by Irina Frolova.
Untouchable
We skype with my family.
Babushka calls you darling boy and
Мишенька.
The name lands
softly
like a wish on a dandelion.
Here, the space left for me dissipating,
I hold my breath whenever I spell my name
to a stranger.
I turn to you, who sees
the unspeakable, the (under)current,
holds the untouchable.
Your hand on mine, we sigh—
in this moment, free
to exhale.
Note: Мишенька – Michael
Leaf Angels
I believe nothing
will remain of us
but this
moonlight
on the lake’s ink
a twinkle of
wonder
in the dark eye of night
an indigo shimmer
where the horizon rests
undefined
& indefinite
and by this
I mean nothing
but song
whirling
in winter’s air
over the silhouettes of birds
nothing will remain
in the way
but this
silk of the spider web
quivering
with drops of rain
where the sun sifts
through the tangle
of trees
and by this
I mean something
like chaos
growing evergreen
in the rustle of yesterday’s
leaves
dry with grief
we can burn
or fall
arms flailing
leaf angels
in love
and by this
I mean
everything
© Irina Frolova
Irina Frolova lives on Awabakal Country in Lake Macquarie, NSW with her children and fur babies. Irina’s work explores life and belonging through cultural, feminist, psychological, and neurodiversity lenses. Her creative highlights include her poetry collection Far and Wild (Flying Islands, 2021), the second prize in the 2021 Deborah Cass Prize for Writing, and poems recognised in the 2023 University of Canberra VC International Poetry Prize, the 2023 Heroines Women’s Writing Prize, the 2024 Liquid Amber Poetry Prize: Poetry of Change, the 2025 Poetry d’Amour Love Poetry Contest, and winning The Australian Haiku Society 2025 Autumn Equinox Kukai competition.