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Live Encounters Poetry & Writing January 2023
A no-body, poem by Elif Sezen.
A no-body
Of no-where, no-time
coughing up his lungs in perfect pitch
watched over by some Cosmic Eye in amusement
‘What the hell?’ he murmured,
cancer, heart disease, all malaise imaginable
Then walked in the doctor through a thick door frame
staring helplessly at a body caging fractured soul-bits.
The patient said,
I need to smell a rose
go to sleep
and expect a visitor
© Elif Sezen
Elif Sezen is an Australian/Turkish interdisciplinary artist, bilingual poet/writer and translator. She obtained her PhD in Fine Art from Monash University (2014). Elif’s practice evolves through various media including painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, print media, installation, performance, music, digital media, artist’s books and poetry. In her work she speculates upon reconceptualising memory traces emerging from familial/personal/collective trauma and loss. This explorative process leads her to rather a restorative and even a celebrative notion of self-construction, desire, longing and a sense of homecoming. Her poetry collection Universal Mother was published by Gloria SMH Press in 2016; and her recent work A Little Book of Unspoken History by Puncher & Wattmann in 2018. Elif’s Turkish translation of Ilya Kaminsky’s acclaimed book Dancing in Odessa was published by Artshop Press. She recently received the YTB Turkish Literary Awards 2021 –First prize in Poetry. Her work has widely appeared nationally and internationally in journals and anthologies. She lives and works in Melbourne. Her website: https://www.elifsezen.com/