by Madeleine Dale

I break the surface of anger 
unexpectedly, like a diver 

prising the bay into halves,
a knife through muscle 

and shell. The oyster reefs
were licking the tide clean,

honeycombed on their racks,
varnishing their little hurts

without philosophy. Helpless
as swell, I have painted 

indifference over injury,
and it has turned 

so heavy. My body lolls
in the estuary, where silt 

meets salt. Broken shuck
catches my skin. I carry

the pearl-weight of love
                       out to sea.

Madeleine Dale grew up on Tamborine Mountain and now lives in Brisbane. She holds first-class honours and a Masters degree in creative writing from the University of Queensland, where she is currently completing a PhD. Her first chapbook, On Fire with Dangerous Cargo, was published by Queensland Poetry in 2023. Her first full length collection, Portraits of Drowning, won the 2023 Thomas Shapcott Prize and is forthcoming from UQP.

by Rae White

​bloated catfish surge 
at the cusp of river’s 
oil-licked lips.
the bent elbows and legs 
of rocks have grey foam 
and bottle tops 
in their crooks. 

at my side, your fist 
is clenched 
like balled-up lunch wrap. 

‘what a mess’ lingers 
at the edge of my teeth 
before I swallow it down 
with my throat’s impatient bile. 

a waning moon flickers 
behind wind-ruffled blue gums. 
another storm 
is on the way.

Rae White (they/them) is a non-binary transgender poet, writer and zine maker. They're the award-winning author of poetry collections Milk Teeth (UQP 2018) and Exactly As I Am (UQP 2022), and the Bitsy game stand up. Rae is the founding editor of #EnbyLife, a journal for non-binary creatives.

by Genevieve Osborne

Coast Dawn

​​A slow light fingers into cracks and angles
Spills over cliffs and pools;

Pinks the streaming manes of skittish mares
And combs the fur of foxes loping to their lairs;

Works into a weighty nest of sticks
To hone the eagle’s beak;

Glints the scales of mullet rising in a wave
And pokes the rosy bones of fruit bats fallen in a cave;

Sidles through a valley to a farm
And flames the windows of the sleeping house;

Bloods the veiny ears of pigs blinking in their pens
Then primes the udders of the waiting cows;

Wakes the rooster         shatters in his crow
And showers in shards and prisms on his hens.

Garfish

Is it the way a shaft of winter light leans  
into the kitchen       
that lets these distant pictures play now       sharp and clear?
Hands lift a parcel        test its weight        fold back 
white paper        garfish       
I watch my mother line them up on the old marble topped table  
slim silver bodies        each with a slender sword
watch her sprinkle on the flour        rub it gently 
on the cleaned slippery skin        and place them side by side 
in the hot oil in the pan        with their tails curved 
up one side and their snouts pointing over the edge of the other       
watch her turn them deftly        and lift them out
onto a plate lined with kitchen paper        a row of pale       
golden fish with skin just crisp 
moist white flesh to drizzle with lemon and separate
carefully from the almost invisible bones. 

Genevieve Osborne is a Sydney writer.  Her poems have appeared in various journals including Southerly, Meanjin, Island, Red Room Poetry's The Disappearing and The Emma Press Anthology of the Sea (UK).  She was joint winner of the Henry Lawson Prize for Poetry and runner-up in the Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize.  Genevieve spends a fair amount of time thinking about food and cooking.  Her favourite place to be when growing up was in the kitchen, watching her mother cook.  She says her mother was the best cook she has ever known.