Thursday 14 June 2007

Postscripts I-III

I. David Malouf’s new book of poetry, Typewriter Music (University of Queensland Press, 2007), is magnificent. I still can’t enjoy his fiction, but his poetry truly evokes place and emotion and is wonderfully Australian. And the book itself is beautiful. Simply holding it in your hands is a pleasure. Here he writes of water tanks:

Squat corrugated-iron
clouds lashed down
with ropes of Morning Glory, galvanised
angels filled with the sky’s
outpourings…

II. For your information, in the contest between gravity and laundry, as always, gravity triumphed and something had to be done.

III. And a reader pointed out to me that in marriage there is a third way. There is practicality, romance and the modern idea of marriage as consumption – a lifestyle choice, a luxury product to be flaunted as a symbol of achievement. As an illustration of marriage gone wrong, it leaves practicality as an attractive option. Thanks Kate.

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