Good For It - by Lillian Telford
Nonfiction Lillian Telford Nonfiction Lillian Telford

Good For It - by Lillian Telford

Content warning: this essay discusses rape and trauma.

2021: Whenever it happens, the tweets and subtweets say similar things. I join in the shared rage, retweeting heavy words of condemnation. Our stories of trauma are sent into the ether, where screams and cries become whispers against the backdrop of coding and HTML.

In the Twittersphere, someone asks how we can be mad at Morrison’s comments when an old white man will speak like an old white man. After all, boys will be boys …

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An Encounter - by Katerina Gibson
Fiction Katerina Gibson Fiction Katerina Gibson

An Encounter - by Katerina Gibson

One day in a foreign country in a district you did not know existed until the year previous, you will run into someone you know, or used to know, from your childhood. Seeing you first, they will be so shocked as to stop short, which, when the moment of recognition hits — after the mental arithmetic required to identify a face you know in a place you don’t and age it, applying wrinkles, receding hairlines — you do also …

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Peace Body Pain Body - by Jarad Bruinstroop
Nonfiction Jarad Bruinstroop Nonfiction Jarad Bruinstroop

Peace Body Pain Body - by Jarad Bruinstroop

… At the hospital, they call chronic pain ‘persistent pain’. ‘Persistent’ has a more positive connotation, but it also suggests the pain has agency. The pain does not persist. I persist.

The head of the spinal clinic tells me there’s no point in more physiotherapy, since I reported no benefit from it. I ask him what he would do if he were me. He says, I would try to learn to live with the pain. We are talking on the phone, so I can’t see his face. And he can’t see the expression on mine …

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Captain Boner - by Alex Cothren
Fiction Alex Cothren Fiction Alex Cothren

Captain Boner - by Alex Cothren

Captain Honor: Brooklyn-based superhero who is capable of flight and superhuman strength. Known as the ‘Guardian of the Bridge’ due to the high number of suicide attempts he has prevented from the Brooklyn Bridge. Captain Honor is currently under review for acceptance into Manhattan’s Hall of Justice supergroup …

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The Orchid - by Erica Wheadon
Nonfiction Erica Wheadon Nonfiction Erica Wheadon

The Orchid - by Erica Wheadon

Your husband gives you an orchid for Valentine’s Day. Again. You don’t know why he bothers and tell him so. All you have to do is look after it, he shrugs, and you twist your mouth into a smile, place the pot on the corner of the deck next to the hammock and stare at it like you would a newborn baby that has been thrust on you …

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Into the Clear Blue - by Susan McCreery
Fiction Susan McCreery Fiction Susan McCreery

Into the Clear Blue - by Susan McCreery

… Here’s my theory: you can tell a lot about a man and his opinion of women by his lap-lane etiquette. Men who shift to one side at the wall, nod off you go, are allies. Fast women swimmers are no threat to these men. Then there are those who refuse to give way, no matter how obvious it is they’re being out-swum, who, according to my theory, expect you to do everything except take out the bins, who get the shits when your salary outstrips theirs, and who rage whenever you’re curled up in sorrow about your grandmother, who is interstate and dying …

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Various Emilys/Gondals - by Josie/Jocelyn Deane
Nonfiction Josie/Jocelyn Deane Nonfiction Josie/Jocelyn Deane

Various Emilys/Gondals - by Josie/Jocelyn Deane

We’re getting back into Dungeons and Dragons, ordering Ghost Pan pizza. I’m experimenting with close reading, through the language of dice rolls and spell lists. Emily Dickinson, my character – who may not be an exact representation of Emily Dickinson – is sleeping in the garret she rents in the fictional city of Sigil. We agree there’s nothing much in her room. A bed. A chest of drawers, a mirror and a crucifix, a chair. Emily’s white dress is slumped across its back, caked in dry sewage …

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Surrogate Mother - by Helena Pantsis
Fiction Helena Pantsis Fiction Helena Pantsis

Surrogate Mother - by Helena Pantsis

Her body grew transparent under the weight of the water, her skin shrinking against the porcelain. The spiders spent more time inside these walls than she had. She hadn't been home in years.

Is it okay, ma, if I stay here a while?

Take as long as you need, darling …

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Fluctuations in Landscape/Language/Lasagne - by Christine Howe
Nonfiction Christine Howe Nonfiction Christine Howe

Fluctuations in Landscape/Language/Lasagne - by Christine Howe

… here we are – writers, artists, geographers – on a bend in the river, talking about our shared coastlines. We tussle with the knowledge that the coastal areas we love are already experiencing the effects of climate change, and we brainstorm how we might create art that could help our communities envision a vastly different future. We talk, walk and write together …

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An August for My July Mother - by Karina Ko
Fiction Karina Ko Fiction Karina Ko

An August for My July Mother - by Karina Ko

‘Augustus is an interesting name for a Vietnamese man,’ I’d said to Felix when we first met in a community hall in Parramatta. We were upcycling fences into benches. He’d told me that he lived with an Augustus after I asked whether his own name was inspired by something ancient Roman, or the fat cat …

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Witchcraft, charming, &c. - by Eliza Henry-Jones
Nonfiction Eliza Henry-Jones Nonfiction Eliza Henry-Jones

Witchcraft, charming, &c. - by Eliza Henry-Jones

You live on a wild and beautiful collection of islands off the coast of mainland Scotland. Your name is Jonet. On the 14th of May, 1643, you are denounced as a witch by your neighbours. You are charged with witchcraft, charming &c. and soon you will be sentenced to die. Did you hear whispers of unrest on the sharp wind, kicked up from the icy tides of the North Sea? Or is the denouncement a shock to you? …

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The Good Woman - by Anneliz Erese
Fiction Anneliz Erese Fiction Anneliz Erese

The Good Woman - by Anneliz Erese

She wakes up before her husband. Turns on the shower for him. Hot, steamy, just the way he likes it. She waits with a fresh towel. Hands it to him, warm, soft, just the way he likes it. Not long after, she cooks breakfast in the kitchen. No radio, only newspaper. She prepares the tea. Hot, steamy. Cups in perfect order. Quiet …

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Submerged - by Nova Weetman
Nonfiction Nova Weetman Nonfiction Nova Weetman

Submerged - by Nova Weetman

A reflection on swimming through the pandemic; swimming for much more than the exercise alone …
There must have been other people we knew at the Croydon pool, but I don’t remember them. It was like all that space existed just for the three of us. All January, Mum would be in her spotted bikini, sunbaking with reef oil splashed across her skin, and I’d be in my bright yellow bather bottoms with ties at the sides; my long hair in two messy ponytails and zinc in a stripe across my freckled nose. We’d try to arrive just as the turnstiles opened, then we’d dash across the hot concrete to the patchy grass that skirted the 50-metre pool …

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A Man Alone - by Mark O’Flynn
Fiction Mark O'Flynn Fiction Mark O'Flynn

A Man Alone - by Mark O’Flynn

Take a house in any land and in it place a man. A man alone: demonstrable, verifiable, did not get there by himself. He must have had progenitors. A carpenter at least. A man like this, who has never lived in any other house. At least not one that he can remember; but then memory is a flippant thing. In any event, there are no other houses nearby, unless you count the lightning-struck ruin next door, whose owner shook his fist at the sky …

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Pilgrimage to Frog Hollow - by Clare Murphy
Nonfiction Clare Murphy Nonfiction Clare Murphy

Pilgrimage to Frog Hollow - by Clare Murphy

We are here in search of the same thing: some kind of restoration. A salve. Something increasingly referred to as green therapy. We are here because we do not know where else to go …
As if following the Zealous Settler’s Handbook of Coloniser Tropes, we lose our way somewhere between the Echidna Track and the Entolasia Trail and descend into sour looks and barely bitten tongues. The fresh air we’ve come for simmers in our lungs …

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Boxing Day - by Fiona Robertson
Fiction Fiona Robertson Fiction Fiona Robertson

Boxing Day - by Fiona Robertson

Nadine placed a hand on Herc’s chest. Above the bed, the fan stirred tropical air. ‘We should have sex,’ she said, ‘since we didn’t for Christmas.’
Herc raised his eyebrows. ‘Wow, what an offer.’ He began to lift her fingers one by one, flexing them back a little too far, so that she pulled her hand away.
‘Herc, don’t.’

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You Can’t Go Home Again - by Jenny Sinclair
Nonfiction Jenny Sinclair Nonfiction Jenny Sinclair

You Can’t Go Home Again - by Jenny Sinclair

A brief moment of memoir that captures so much:
You can’t go home again. But you do, tearing up the highway to get there just in time. And there they all are, the faces and the names. Names without faces, floating in the air on a willy-willy of small-town gossip. You should know the names, but it’s been so many years …

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Severe Weather Warning - by Miriam Webster
Fiction Miriam Webster Fiction Miriam Webster

Severe Weather Warning - by Miriam Webster

I was walking the dog at the beach when I saw rats throwing themselves into the sea, spilling over the shoreline in a great tumble of nose and tail. All the birds left. The dogs’ hair prickled and stood on end; electrified, we thought, by atmospheric changes ominous and invisible. At dusk they let out one, unified bark. The cats stayed indoors, licking themselves. Those who find meaning in constellations blamed it on the moon in Scorpio, that volatile sign. Those of sound mind blamed it on climate change …

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31.5°S, 159°E - by Keely Jobe
Nonfiction Keely Jobe Nonfiction Keely Jobe

31.5°S, 159°E - by Keely Jobe

In the centre of the bird, a message.
Bottle top golf tee balloon clip tube cap cable tie nurdle pen top strapping tape twist top lollipop bread tag glow stick …

I see Jenn standing with a group of bird carcasses. Her back is to the ocean, the shearwaters are fanned out in front. There’s something ceremonial about the image – the bodies are laid with care – but there’s no avoiding the violence. The birds are knocked over like bowling pins. It’s a strike …

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Three Fragments - by Cameron Hindrum
Fiction Cameron Hindrum Fiction Cameron Hindrum

Three Fragments - by Cameron Hindrum

Three delicate, beautiful, devastating vignettes from a versatile Tasmanian writer.
… I start the car and the old man listens and my great-grandmother is sitting next to me, holding flowers in her papery hands …
… Can’t describe the sound. Tyres locked up, a squeal harsh in the darkness, a soft crump, metal hitting metal like a full stop at the end of the squealing and glass breaking …

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