Ways of Writing, Reading and Translating: genre-crossing in the 21st century
After attending the Qinghai International Poetry Festival in early August this year, I decided to find my way about the provinces by first going to Sweet Serious, my direct translation of Gansu. Even...
View ArticleThe Head Transplant
Written in Chinese by John Sheng Translated into English by Ouyang Yu For someone to be cured of his uremia, it is necessary for him to go through a kidney transplant operation. If it is a liver...
View ArticleThe turning land
The Old Man Van gives up precisely at the turn-off from the main road to the dirt track that leads to our destination. Noxious grey smoke spews out from the engine located in the front cabin and my...
View ArticleA traditional offer
For my family, Lunar New Year – tet in Vietnamese – is the most important celebration of the year. My parents used to host huge parties where the men would get wildly drunk discussing politics and...
View ArticleInterview with Cyrus Tang
Cyrus Tang is a contemporary artist who was born in Hong Kong and now lives and works in Melbourne. Tang trained in ceramic arts at the Victorian College of the Arts, before completing her Masters of...
View ArticleI REMEMBER ???
for Choi Sung Hee i remember Jeju-do: that living eye, a candy-coloured sky that was remote- controlled by Halla-san, our Lord Muck, or else a lady mountain gathering skirts around her as th’ cloud...
View ArticleStars over Kai Tak
I still look for your altar; what is left lies dreaming of forgotten stars, teaching constellations to silence. You hunger. My sabaism is a vane that measures your upward gaze, dysphoric I’ll feed you,...
View ArticleInterview with Shoufay Derz
Shoufay Derz is an emerging artist based in Sydney of both German and Taiwanese ancestry. She is a lecturer and multi-disciplinary artist working with photography, video and sculpture. In 2011, she...
View ArticleSee how the leaf people run
The following text is an extract from Michele Lee‘s radio play See how the leaf people run which was broadcasted on Radio National in late August. The playscript will be published in full by The...
View ArticleShadow
They always greet me with this: ‘Come here alone, have you?’ But wherever I go I bring my shadow …forever and forever, it is the shadows that have helped me By lighting up the surroundings When there...
View ArticleThe seed of enlightenment
After I recovered from a psychotic episode I was bitterly disappointed. Common mythology had it that the psychic and the psychotic lay close together and that some psychoses were spiritual emergencies...
View ArticleIn the spirit of your name
Dear Emi, As I write this, you’re merely 7 weeks old. It’s hard for me to believe that eight weeks ago you were an aquanaut, swooshing in my belly. I’m writing because your Dad and I are planning a...
View ArticleTuesdays with my Mother
Tuesdays with my mother were akin to Morrie’s life lessons. I was in my late teens and every Tuesday, after school, we’d begin our ritual. Slice five limes in half, scoop out the pulp and you’re left...
View ArticleSpirit Worlds Editorial – Visual Arts
As a child, I remember our annual family trip to Rookwood Cemetery in western Sydney, where we would go to honour our ancestors during Ching Ming, the Clear Brightness Festival. We joined the crowds of...
View ArticleSpirit Worlds Editorial – Poetry
Despite having been raised Catholic, my brother’s fascination with gaming means that the phrase “Spirit World” conjures up the 28th level of Doom II, so it was interesting for me to see the range of...
View ArticleSpirit Worlds Editorial – Prose
Every now and then, I wonder about the year of my birth, the year that my grandfather died. His A4 framed black and white portrait looked on benignly in our family hallway, and while there was nothing...
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