New Poets 21

Proud to have been part of the launch of Friendly Street's New Poets 21 collection last night, in company with Tarla Ritchie and Mark Kramer. If you'd like to buy a copy, they're a bit old school on payments and there are no e-book versions available but we'd all be pleased if you could see …

Word Prompt Stories – Kurdaitcha man

This piece was written for the weekly 99 word Carrot Ranch Flash Fiction Challenge with the prompt of 'write a spooky tale told around a campfire'. I suggest you read this link beforehand. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdaitcha This was the first cattle drive for the Arrente boy the whitefellas called Jimmy. The whitefellas couldn’t care less for blackfella …

Occasional Ravings – The great poetry joke

I read a couple of ‘poems’ in a daily newspaper today. Poems appearing in newspapers should be cause for celebration but, as always, it caused me despair. Below you will find the two poems: Freehold by Theodore Eli and Her Late Hand by Jaya Savige, as well as an extract from Sarah Holland-Blatt's breathless take …

Exotica

This piece was written for the monthly Blog Battle 1,000 word challenge with the prompt of 'exotic'. Harley had become stupendously rich (as in Gates, Zuckerberg, Bezos, Musk and the like being minor players). His wealth derived from what others threw away. He had invented technology that mined dump sites for plastic and then re-constituted …

Scenes from the road in America – 3 (Warning- May contain traces of Canada.)

New York. I’ve braved the slush and the biting wind to stroll down Broadway and to watch people skiing and snowboarding in Central Park. Having returned to my hotel and removed a couple of layers of clothing, I’m sitting in the bar downstairs and chatting with a Norwegian man who speaks impeccable English. He tells …

Pass the lemon

This piece in my Occasional Ravings category is brief exploration into my past life as a manager in various settings. ‘Pass the lemon’ is a phrase I coined to describe a phenomenon that plagues managers worldwide, especially in government service and in large corporations. It refers to the practice of dishonestly moving underperformers and malcontents …

Scenes from the road in the UK – 1

London. This is my first overseas trip beyond Asia and my first chance to meet face to face with some of our sister organisations from other countries. We land as the sun is rising in a clear sky. I take the shuttle bus to my hotel on the South Bank and along the way get …

Scenes from the road in America 2

New Orleans. It’s a year after Hurricane Katrina and it is impossible not to be moved by the devastation to local communities and the stories related by our local conference delegates about the snail’s pace reconstruction efforts, especially in the African-American neighbourhoods. My South African colleague and I agree on most things (except for when …

Scenes from the road in America – 1

Virginia (various towns). I have rented a car to drive from Washington, DC to Austin, Texas. I’m on my own time until I get there and I imagine myself in every American road movie I’ve ever seen. Sounded good until I left the rental garage and experience the reality of a whole new world where …

Scenes from the Asian road – 3

Delhi. I am travelling in a tuktuk to a conference venue with a young American colleague who is profoundly deaf. He is possessed of a wild shock of red hair. I tell him to expect a lot of attention in a country where black is the new black when it comes to hair colour. I …