Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Juan Garrido-Salgado immigrated to Australia from Chile in 1990, fleeing the regime that burned his poetry and imprisoned and tortured him for his political activism. He has published eight books of poetry and his work has been widely translated. He has also translated works by a number of leading Australian & Aboriginal poets into Spanish, including five Aboriginal poets for the anthology Espejo de Tierra/ Earth Mirror (2008).

With Steve Brock and Sergio Holas, Garrido-Salgado also translated into English the Trilingual Mapuche Poetry Anthology. The book When I was Clandestine was part of a poetical tour at the Granada International Poetry Festival in Nicaragua, Mexico and Cuba (La Habana City) in 2019.

Hope Blossoming in Their Ink was published by Puncher & Wattman in 2020.

You can purchase Juan Garrido-Salgado's books here:

Hope Blossoming in Their Ink

https://puncherandwattmann.com/authors/Juan-Garrido-Salgado/

Cuando Fui Clandestino/When I was Clandestine

https://rochford-pressbookshop.square.site/product/cuando-fui-clandestino-when-i-was-clandestine-by-juan-garrido-salgado/1

The chapbook - Dialogue with Samuel Lafferte in Australia 2016 can be ordered by email: [email protected]

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Michele Seminara is a poet and editor from Sydney.

Her writing has twice been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and has appeared in journals such as Cordite, Mascara Literary Review, Jacket2 Magazine and Australian Poetry Journal.

She has published two full-length collections, Suburban Fantasy (UWA Publishing, 2021) and Engraft(Island Press, 2016), and chapbooks Scar to Scar (written with Robbie Coburn, PressPress, 2016) and HUSH (Blank Rune Press, 2017).

Michele has performed her poetry, chaired panels and appeared at numerous literary events and festivals across Australia, including Newcastle Writers Festival, Wollongong Writers Festival, Queensland Poetry Festival, and (upcoming in August 2021) Canberra Writers Festival.

She is curator of the Manly Art Gallery& Museum Poetry Alive Readings, and managing editor of online creative arts journal Verity La.

Find more from Michele at her website: https://micheleseminara.net/

You can buy Engraft, Scar to Scar and Hush directly from Michele's website: https://micheleseminara.net/shop/.

Michele's latest collection, Suburban Fantasy, can be purchased from UWA Publishing: https://uwap.uwa.edu.au/products/suburban-fantasy?_pos=1&_sid=efccd4a5c&_ss=r

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Anthony Lawrence has published seventeen books of poems and novel. His most recent collection is ‘Ken’ (Life Before Man, 2021).

His books and individual poems have won many awards, including the Prime Ministers Literary Award for Poetry, The Kenneth Slessor Award,

The Judith Wright Calanthe Award, the Philip Hodgins Memorial Medal and the Blake Poetry Prize.

A new collection of prose poems ’The Side the Weather Does Not Love’ is to be published in 2021.

He teaches Creative Writing and Writing Poetry at Griffith University, and lives on Moreton Bay, Queensland.

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Melbourne-based poet, Peter Bakowski, fell in love with the map of the world at the age of six. In 1983 he wrote his first poem while staying at a friend’s farmhouse in Waco, Texas, in response to receiving a “Dear John” letter from a Melbourne girl. As a result of that fateful letter, Peter ended up travelling for seven years, caught a freight train across Montana, lived in a cave on a Mexican island and ate gazelle cooked in stale blood with road builders in the Central Africa Republic. Peter has been writer-in-residence in Rome, Paris, Macau, Suzhou (China), Battery Point, Tasmania; Greenmount, Western Australia and at the Broken Hill Writers Festival. His poems continue to appear in literary magazines worldwide and have been translated into Arabic, Bahasa-Indonesian, Bengali, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin and Polish.

The following titles by Peter Bakowski are available to buy (prices listed and post-free):

• The Heart At 3am (Hale & Iremonger, 1997) $20

• Days That We Couldn’t Rehearse (Hale & Iremonger 2002) $20

• Beneath Our Armour (Hunter Publishers, 2009) $20

• Personal Weather (Hunter Publishers, 2014) $20

• The Courage Season (Guillotine Press, 2017) $20

• The Elsewhere Variations (co-written with Ken Bolton) (Wakefield Press, 2019) $20

• Wardrobe of Selves (Recent Work Press, 2019) $15

If interested, email Peter: [email protected]

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Originally from the west of Ireland and living in Sydney, Anne Casey is an award-winning poet and author of two critically acclaimed poetry collections— where the lost things go (Salmon Poetry 2017, 2nd ed 2018) and out of emptied cups (Salmon Poetry 2019). She has worked for 30 years as a journalist, magazine editor, media communications director and legal author.

Anne’s poetry has won/shortlisted for awards in Ireland, Northern Ireland, the USA, the UK, Canada, Hong Kong and Australia. Senior Poetry Editor of Other Terrain Journal and Backstory Journal (Swinburne University, Melbourne) from 2017-2020, she serves on numerous literary advisory boards. She holds a Law Degree from University College Dublin and qualifications in Media Communications.

Books

'out of emptied cups' (Salmon Poetry 2019) https://www.salmonpoetry.com/details....​

'where the lost things go' (Salmon Poetry 2017) https://www.salmonpoetry.com/details....​

Website

anne-casey.com

Social media - Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn

@1annecasey

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poet's Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Andy Jackson's first published book of poems, Among the Regulars, was shortlisted for the 2011 Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry, and his most recent collection, Music Our Bodies Can't Hold, which consists of portrait poems of other people with Marfan Syndrome, was shortlisted for the 2020 John Bray Poetry Award. He has co-edited disability-themed issues of the literary journals Southerly and Australian Poetry Journal, and he has been a creative writing teacher and tutor for community organisations and universities.

Books:

amongtheregulars.com

hunterpublishers.com.au/books/music-our-bodies-cant-hold

transitlounge.com.au/shop/immune-systems

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poet's Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Geoff Goodfellow has established a reputation for giving voice to a wide range of people who wouldn’t normally be the subjects of poetry or prose. He left school at fifteen and began to write in 1982 at the age of thirty-three. He had worked for many years in semi-skilled occupations. Essentially, he is an auto-didact.

In February of 2008 Geoff was diagnosed with cancer of the throat and told he had one to five years to live. Geoff continues to defy the odds. In 2011 he published Waltzing with Jack Dancer: a slow dance with cancer (Wakefield Press). His first collection of poetry No Collars No Cuffs was launched at Adelaide Writer’s Week in 1986. It has been re-printed nine times. Ten books have followed, most going into multiple print runs. An eleventh book, his first book of short stories Out of Copley Street (Wakefield Press) will be launched at the Hawke Centre in Adelaide on October 29th by Professor Rick Sarre, Dean of Law at UniSA.

Geoff has worked as a writer-in-residence in school, jails, youth detention centres, drug & alcohol rehabilitation units, building and construction sites, factories, mad-houses…as well as in universities in Australia and overseas. He has toured Canada, USA, Cuba, China, Europe and the UK, giving readings of his work as well as taking up residencies. In 1988 Geoff was awarded the Inaugural Carclew Fellowship at the Festival Awards for Literature, to assist the development of young South Australian writers.

In 2002 his collection Poems for a Dead Father was short listed for the Age Book of the Year award. His poems have appeared in The Best Australian Poetry 2009 and The Best Australian Poems 2011, 2012, 2014 & 2015. Geoff grew up in the inner-northern suburbs of Adelaide but has lived most of his adult life close to the beach at Semaphore.

Website: www.geoffgoodfellow.com

You can purchase Geoff's books here:

https://www.wakefieldpress.com.au​

https://www.wakefieldpress.com.au/pro...​

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of...

Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Judy Johnson is an award-winning poet with a special interest in bringing to life little known but fascinating aspects of Australia's history. Prizes for her historical narratives include the Banjo Paterson Award, which she won three years in a row, and the Val Vallis Award. She has also been the recipient of three New Work Grants from the Literature Board of the Australia Council. Judy Johnson lives on the NSW Central Coast.

You can purchase Judy Johnson's books here:

Dark Convicts https://uwap.uwa.edu.au/collections/j...​

Nomadic https://blackpepperpublishing.com/joh...​

Jack https://www.panmacmillan.com.au/9781741987287/jack/

______

ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Nathanael O’Reilly is an Irish-Australian residing in Texas. His books include (Un)belonging (Recent Work Press, 2020); Preparations for Departure (UWAP, 2017), named one of the Books of the Year in Australian Book Review; Cult (Ginninderra Press, 2016); Distance (Ginninderra Press, 2015); Suburban Exile (Picaro Press, 2011); and Symptoms of Homesickness (Picaro Press, 2010). More than 200 of his poems have appeared in journals and anthologies published in twelve countries, including Antipodes, Anthropocene, Australian Love Poems, Cordite, fourW, FourXFour, Headstuff, Marathon, Mascara, Postcolonial Text, Skylight 47, Snorkel, Transnational Literature and The Newcastle Poetry Prize Anthology 2017.

You can purchase Nathanael O'Reilly's books here:

(Un)Belonging https://recentworkpress.com/books/pro...​

Preparations for Departure https://uwap.uwa.edu.au/products/prep...​

______

ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Poets' Corner is WestWords' monthly encounter with celebrated Australian poets, curated by David Ades.

Each month a poet is invited to read and talk about their poetry on a theme of the poet's choice.

Melinda Smith is a poet, editor, teacher, arts advocate and event curator. Her latest book, Man-handled, has just been published by Recent Work Press. She is the author of seven other poetry books, including the 2014 Prime Minister’s Literary Award winner, Drag down to unlock or place an emergency call. She frequently collaborates with artists in other disciplines including dancers, musicians and visual artists, and is a former poetry editor of The Canberra Times. She lives and writes in the ACT, on Ngunnawal Country.

Publications

• Man-handled (Recent Work Press, 2020)

• Perfectly Bruised (bilingual Mandarin + English selected) (Flying Islands Press, 2019)

• Listen, bitch (with artist Caren Florance, Recent Work Press, 2019)

• Members Only (with artist Caren Florance, Recent Work Press, 2017)

• Goodbye, Cruel (Pitt St Poetry, 2017)

• Drag down to unlock or place an emergency call (Pitt St Poetry, 2013)

• First... Then... (Ginninderra Press, 2012)

• Mapless in Underland (Ginninderra Press, 2004)

• Pushing thirty, wearing seventeen (Ginninderra Press, 2001)

You can purchase Melinda Smith's books here:

https://melindasmithpoet.com/shop/​

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ABOUT WESTWORDS

WestWords is a literature organisation whose mission is to provide support and resources for the writers, poets, artists, storytellers and creators of Western Sydney, in the form of events, workshops, residencies, school visits, fellowships, groups, consultations and mentorships.

For more information, visit our website at https://www.westwords.com.au/​

WestWords is proudly supported by:

* CREATE NSW –Arts, Screen & Culture

* COPYRIGHT AGENCY Cultural Fund

* The City of Parramatta

* Blacktown City Council

* Campbelltown City Council

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com