Live Encounters Poetry & Writing May 2021
Special edition featuring poets from Australia & New Zealand.
Eugen Bacon is African Australian, a computer scientist mentally re-engineered into creative writing. She’s the author of Claiming T-Mo and Road to Woop Woop (Meerkat Press), Ivory’s Story (NewCon Press) and Writing Speculative Fiction (Macmillan). Her work has won, been shortlisted, longlisted or commended in national and international awards, including the BSFA Awards, Foreword Book of the Year Awards, Bridport Prize, Copyright Agency Prize, Australian Shadows Awards, Ditmar Awards and Nommo Awards for Speculative Fiction by Africans. Eugen is a recipient of the Katharine Susannah Prichard (KSP) Emerging Writer-in-Residence 2021. Her creative work has appeared in literary and speculative fiction publications worldwide, including Award Winning Australian Writing, Anthology of Australian Prose Poetry, Aurealis, Bards and Sages, Meniscus, TEXT Journal, Unsung Stories, British Science Fiction Association’s Vector Magazine and through Routledge in New Writing. Her collection Danged Black Thing is out with Transit Lounge Publishing in 2021. Website: eugenbacon.com/ Twitter:@EugenBacon
Frame of Reference
Love is…
an apartment lit with hand-painted watercolours vases and photographs
memories in a frame a big screen right there 65-inch high definition
you make a cuppa vanilla chai one minute in the microwave
milk’s just right now look at the bills
Love is…
a toilet seat practical engineered for a purpose works because of gravity
it’s not to eat breakfast / check your emails just a healthy disposal unit
takes what you discard saves you from a megacolon
how long can you go without
Love is…
a box of tissues craving crumbs of sourdough drools of soup
it’s not a sofa that knows skin and bums feet and cheeks
it’s not a letter from the bank a copy of your insurance
just a box of tissues unremembered on a coffee table
Love is…
an uber sometimes on time sometimes it isn’t you don’t know what you get
but you can cancel the fare one driver asks do you want water
takes you to a destination rates you out of five
you rate them back is that what you want
Love is…
an airport hosts in immaculate caps here’s your boarding pass
travel information declarations restrictions that apply
but all you think is hotspots not the WI-FI kind
there’s not enough runway
Love is…
a swimming pool azure water ebony lines sunlit rays through a glassy roof
a bench you never sit on a silent clock tick tock tick tocking as you dive
mostly you’re alone bubbles as you breathe shimmers on the lanes
dead lizard on the floor water’s ruffled when you leave
The Siren Never Blows
shoulders out in a woo you’re together and toy with the other team
your synergy dominates a perfect finish you don’t know
where it’ll take you but it matters you speak the same language—anti-them
the difference between a dash and an em dash is never life and death
you exchange vows run centre-half forward-dribble and all in between
you slice your way to shots that arrow the same goal / that’s how ‘tis
you flash through traffic circle back find space minimal capitalisation
is just fine you put numbers on the board it’s a gut run
you learn at the honeymoon your partner’s a left-footer they point the
ball doesn’t go you mistrust your eyes prey on sanity they’re stupid
shots in the throes of a quarter you question dimensions at this rate
full season’s on the wing you see misplaced apostrophe’s and explode
into a shooting star
you fight combined weight but know safe words it’s chill that’s decent
double-time / your partner’s left-foot snapper gets you blue maybe blurred
you go out there still kick long goals dead-straight together it’s on the
boot more than you miss / you flesh out your partner’s acronyms square
up for a last laugh
you devise clever shots against each other leap attack defence extend
make or break / at the three-year mark your default position’s kick smother
strip them off the ball / you go longer / intercept for a free your focus
expands the margin it’s a fucking em dash you stem the bleed
five years on you settle into each other sometimes you don’t you swipe a
vicious forward make critical conversions a few disposals here there
your partner’s silence speaks volumes in a language of babel italicise
foreign words someone’s playing catch up maybe it’s you
often now you sit on the bench / walk on shadows / no chance for erring
nine years on who’ll take the mark there are no hand-passes no play-ons
you get away with half-hearted hit-outs ball outside fragments of a line
you don’t care it’s a comma or a coma damn siren never blows
She Knows
Bottom line is… frog music is ribbit grunt hoot but why through the night
from a pond or a creek in a sweet serenade that keeps her awake yet sleeps
the baby and him / she breathes in closes her nostrils pushes out through
her lips so she can ribbit grunt hoot but only whistles peeps clucks a
stone’s throw to the moss in his heart
Bottom line is… once it was easy like a boat into a jetty / holding hands
was never against the rip / now she sits alone on sand and pebbles waiting
for wash to pull her offshore / she’s on the lip of an edgy current / the
water’s lick at eight feet per second
Bottom line is… she drowns again again / her life flashes in multi choice
she (a) gulps to go back! to three yards of marriage an epoch of waste
(b) tries not to panic (c) finds the dignity of a storm (d) survival-floats
to all of the above
Bottom line is… she moon-hauls to no webbed ecstasy just sirens wailing F#
in 8th octave then a high C / she’s on dry land legs spread wearing odd
socks her toes hurt for a long time / doesn’t take a genius on comas /
near-death / daemons to say don’t worry love cough yourself quiet take
a deep breath and go just go to whatever the fuck you things do
Bottom line is… second sight picks her colours of the day / rosy skirt dusky
blouse / she knows which shoes open-toed no stockings waits for the 3rd
lift / an itch on her palm’s money on the way / the tic on her eyelid’s bad
news setting sail / black iron enters her gut someone she knows dies
Bottom line is… she sees the sex of an unborn child but is polite even when
a spectre is sat on your shoulder more so when a broken ghost has lost its
address / she blinks at the mirror’s unrepentant gaze because second sight
is a bitch / she knows
Bottom line is… she knows
© Eugen Bacon