Glass Issue 9: Grit and Glitter - 2020

Glass QUT GUILD

Issue 09 10-2020

GRIT & GLITTER

NON-FICTION

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Why Glass?

If you’ve heard the phrase “those who live in glass houses

Acknowledgement of Country GLASS Media and the QUT Guild acknowledge the Turrbal and Yugara peoples as the First Nations owners of the lands where QUT now stands. We pay respect to their Elders, past, present and emerging, and their lores, customs and creation spirits. We recognise that these lands have always been places of teaching, research, learning and storytelling.

Glass Media and the QUT Guild acknowledge the important role Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people play within the Meanjin community.

why these people don’t get home insurance insurance.

Cultural Warning

The editors of Glass have wondered this too. The name

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers

for Glass magazine was born from our inability to keep

are warned that the following magazine may

out of Stalkerspace disputes where we don’t belong.

contain references to deceased persons.

should not throw stones”, you have probably wondered

Studies show that 98% of student politicians are unable to keep out of meme debates – this angers 100% of meme group admins.

Disclaimer Glass Media informs readers that the views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this issue

COVER IMAGE FATIMAH ZAHRA BUKSH

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of Glass belong solely to the author, and not necessarily express the views of Glass Media or the QUT Guild.

Contents 4

GLASS

Stories

Spotlight

Poetry

Where is Why.......................... 16

Amy Sargeant......................... 60

Dust And Bone.........................12

The Magician........................... 20 The Sound Of Silence........... 56 A Dream Is A Wish................. 58

Snookered.................................12

Review His Motorbike, Her Island..... 44

Muddied Waters..................... 64

Art Jack Roylance...........................18 Brittany Fenton...................... 24 Komousus................................ 25

John & Toronto.........................13 Stress Leave.............................22 2003..........................................23

Non-Fiction

Reflections On A Swiss Cheese Plant............................26

Then And Now: The Decline Of The University Sector............28

Wet Cigarette......................... 32

Maybe You Should Expect To Be Sexually Harassed.......34

Cancer Culture....................... 33 Butterfly Sleeves.....................36

Bread & Circuses.................... 38

Queer (Adj.).............................37

Essay

Up And Down Praha ............. 42

Knight Errant.......................... 40

All That Glitters Is Not Gold....................................52

The Grimy And Shiny Of This World............................... 46

Ode to Stefanovic................... 41

Always Was Always Will Be..51

Twenny Twennies................... 49

Photography

Allegory of Capitalism...........48

Pure Until Proven Filthy........54

My Mate Ro............................... 10 Julienne Pancho..................... 14 Fatimah Zahra Buksh........... 50 Rhett Hammerton...................62

CONTENTS

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Editor’s Letter

THE GLASS EDITORS ANAHITA EBRAHIMI JASMIN GRAVES EM READMAN

Dear Glassies,

ASHLEIGH NORTH

This edition we turn our eyes to the grit of the world around us.

We’re reminded of the way glass shatters; of beer bottles left on the side of the road, of empty glasses and shattered windows.

We think about how glass can glitter. We think about how glass can break. And how fragile beauty is.

This edition holds a special place in our hearts. It’s a marker; we’re halfway through our term, we’ve published half of our print editions for the year and we’ve hit 63,000 unique views on the Glass website.

It also comes at a time when many of us are watching the world change around us. Some of us are seeing for the first time the grime of institutionalised racism, police brutality and seemingly bleak political landscapes. Others have been watching for years, waiting for or instigating change.

This edition shows us the world through the lens of our contributors; our lives through the looking glass. We’ve combined

Diamonds are the strongest object on our planet. Burst open the champagne

the bad with the good. The grit with the glitter.

and take to the streets with your protest sign. Don’t be afraid to get your hands

As always with love, The Glass Team

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Grit Glitter

dirty for what you believe in. Read between the lines. Remember, all that glitters is not gold. What is different from what it first appears to be, and what can we do about it? Pull back the glamourous facade and show us what lies underneath.

GRIT & GLITTER

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2020 has required far too much grit and delivered not nearly enough glitter. It’s been a confusing mix of electrifying highs and

President’s Letter WRITTEN BY OLIVIA BRUMM

devastating lows. I feel as if I’ve spent most of my time desperately treading water and only just managing to keep my head above the surface. Then, about a month ago, my personal life imploded spectacularly and honestly, I just let go.

who are also struggling to cope at the moment.

As well as immersing myself in work, I’ve also prioritised carving out a section of the week for downtime, I’ve started playing netball and stopped making time with friends and family a second priority. I’ve taken decisive steps to improve both my physical and mental health and although I’m still struggling to catch up in some areas (it’s week 7 and I’m yet to even open

I let go of my ambitions, my passions, my goals

the blackboard site let alone watch a lecture)

and my enjoyment. In the week that followed,

I’m getting better.

I gave myself permission to fail, as if I’d been looking for a reason all along. I wallowed in my grief and became a menace to any wellintended cashier or barista in my area who dared to ask how my day was going. I knew I was at a cross road but instead of choosing a direction all I wanted to do was lie down and disintegrate into the dust.

What I’ve realised is that grit is essential and luckily you can cultivate it. I’m not an innately resilient person, I’m privileged enough that I haven’t faced many serious adversities in my life. So last month when everything started falling apart I didn’t have the experience or coping strategies to deal with my grief properly. I needed help, and grit for me was

At the end of that week, I finally made a decision.

admitting and pursuing that. It was having

Instead of internalising my sorrow, folding in on

the passion and perseverance to force my life

myself and accepting defeat, I decided I was

back on track no matter how many times it got

going to give myself another 14 days. Just two

derailed. It was setting my alarm 2 hours earlier

more weeks to feel as intensely and viscerally

than I needed to get up every morning because

sad as I needed to. Then that was it.

I knew it would take me that long to convince

The Monday after the 14 days I sat down and examined every aspect of my life. I identified what my priorities and long term goals were for my work, university and my social life and I started every day with those in mind. Don’t get me wrong, I still had days where I struggled to get up in the morning. I realised very quickly that grief is neither a linear nor neat process.

But I kept trying, every single day.

Since then, there have been some huge wins not just for me personally but also for the Guild.

From receiving an extra $558k in SSAF funding to pursue new projects and initiatives to the

myself to get out of bed. It was developing selfawareness of my challenges and putting in place strategies to deal with them and when those strategies didn’t work, trying new ones.

Relentless positivity is a curse, you don’t have to be ok all the time and the pressure to present that way will slowly kill you. Masking pain isn’t dealing with it.

Grit your teeth and show up authentically to your grief and pain. Happiness, wonder, excitement and joy can all sit side by side with grief. Feel it all. Then, when you’re ready, get up and power through.

opening of the Queer and Women’s Collective rooms, to getting ready to launch a wide-scale mental health campaign to help other students

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PRESIDENT’S LETTER

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M Y M AT E R O B Y N I N A B U S T E E D

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NON-FICTION

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DUST AND BONE

BY SAVANNAH BARNES

SNOOKERED

BY RILEY BAXTER

JOHN & TORONTO

BY BENJI GORTON

Beauty in the depths and grain of burrows

When the droids that destroy men

As truth is to faith so will is to power

I’m searching for a cure to pain

Slices to idyllic surface

Are all rust-eaten

She counts failures not by days

Hollowed thoughts and neon veins

Revealed lush reality

And the dogs of wrath have barked their last,

But as seconds on hours

Flick the baggie twice, I’m so easy

I lay on cold dirt and tally black sheep

Hold a snow globe to my chest I put my mind on ice

Abounding from volcanic soul Skin simmering

When the pearly gates that read

As great as I feel

Blistering

Love will set you free

I have fallen too deep

Peeling

Swing shut for good and we lay down in sorrow,

Exposing foundational bone Blanketing building blocks found brittle

I will pick up my cue.

Billowing towers buried cold

Sparrows dressed in coats of wool and denim My dream letters are torn up by dawn

Scatter as I collapse on moonlit streets

I speak through the shreds

Black cats prowl and tear parts clean from me

And lay on the lawn

I wake up mute on wet concrete

Mines couldn’t hold fallen grace

I will remember the words of my good doctor

It stings just like death

Too occupied by dusted beginnings

When she said,

When she whispers sweet nothings

Should I find my way back home

For the embrace of mourning persona

Drink until distractions seem a waste of time.

She is wasting her breath

You will not recognise me

You will laugh and say something like,

I’m down and I’m out

Who sings her song at noon

You cannot convince a dying tree

I’m broken and bent

About a little needle

Beneath the bridge I find a puddle

That she deserves love just like every other,

Who ran off with a spoon

And I will sink the white ball in the pocket behind your eye.

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POETRY

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P H O T O G R A P H Y B Y J U L I E N N E PA N C H O

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NON-FICTION

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Where is Why

WRITTEN BY RILEY BAXTER

I spent a year just chasing my tail, befriending

and in those days that I could not make it out of

clock that read ‘It’s 5 O’Clock Somewhere’ was

fleas, and barking into midnight until she bit

bed I often would. The question that always bit

as good as it gets.

back. When I left home, I had a three try lead at

me was the short, sweet, vicious ‘Why?’

half-time. I was the arrogance of youth. People

So maybe I came here with a soul that told itself

I had not moved to Brisbane with any intention

it needed love. Appreciation. Maybe I put my

of making money. Wealth seemed to be its

pen to the paper to be told that I am a good

own queer punishment for a life of hard work,

boy. People have found stranger reasons to

hassle, and hatred. I knew that money could

do things. So that is where my head is at, or

not fix what I have. I doubted that it could help

was, when this thief in the night bitch named

prevent me from becoming the man I was to be.

Corona came to town. Three years in the city

I was too young to know that I was no good at

My old man hated work. He spoke about it like

and not a lot to show for it. Not a lot to pack up

being alone. I would lay awake and wonder how

he was the only person that had ever had to do

and leave with, or without.

many people there were like me. The ne’er do

it. He would get home, slam himself into a beer

wells with above average grades that packed

and talk about work as though he were Christ

up for the city with little more than a foggy

with a 9 to 5 cross, set to make good the sins of

notion of ‘making something for themselves.’

all mankind. Father why hast thou forsaken me?

asked me where I was going, where I would stay.

I told them I was going ‘where I lead me.’ Some were convinced. That was vitality’s trick. Well life scored three on me, right under the post.

Life kicked a field goal in the 80th minute.

Whatever something was and however it was

I am back home now, indefinitely, living with my old man. We watch Sky News and boo at the screen. A pair of geriatric pseudo fascists in nice suits rattling the rocks in their heads

Mum was strong in her own way, though rarely

as they bounce up and down about just

with words. She did not finish high school and

how far this country has gotten ‘off-track’,

would sometimes break down about how little

about the biases of the ABC and lately, more

of a life she had made for herself. She was

than ever, about the dangers of rampant

smart too in her own way, though never with

socialism in Australian universities - as

words. A sometimes stutterer with a nervous

though Stalin were doing star jumps beneath

disposition, herself the child of a hardworking,

the benevolent glow of Kelvin Grove’s

hard drinking, lumberjack and sawmill

Globe, situated ominously at the centre of a

The tens of millions monologue always led to

operator – I once took mushrooms with a

$94,000,000 education precinct. I suppose

a psychological self-evaluation. It was rarely

girl named Rabbit and, for three euphoric

they figure that after everything is privatised

the rumination or regrets that hurt me. I had

hours, convinced myself that I too could find

Jesus will come back, heal their marriages, fix

mostly come to terms with the friends and

myself a life as a lumberjack, until the soft

their hairlines, and save the bees. And I do not

lovers I had left in the lurch. They were their

comedown, where I quietly remembered my

know if I buy all that. But at least these folks

own set in the tens of millions archive. No, I

environmentalist politic – who had seemingly

have a Why. I pray you find yours. I beg you

could deal with those thoughts in the daylight,

convinced her that beer bottle pillows and a

return the favour.

made. Anyhow, the answer always amounted to somewhere in the tens of millions. Tens of millions of young writers with better words.

Tens of millions of young men with stronger arms and heads and hearts. Tens of millions of young people that did not need one more friend, or lover, or co-worker. Tens of millions.

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STORY

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Z I G G Y S TA R D U S T A N D T H E R O V E R S O F M A R S B Y J A C K R O Y L A N C E

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ART

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The Magician ‘Mum, there was a magician at the mall today!’

‘A what now, Emily?’

‘A magician!’

‘A magician.’ Emily’s mother mimicked the words, but her tone was f lattened with disbelief.

‘Yes!’ Emily still could not contain her excitement, ‘A magician!’

Her mother paused. ‘How much did it cost?’

Emily knit her eyebrows in confusion, until the explanation slapped her in the face.

‘It wasn’t a toy,’ Emily grumbled, ‘It was a person! A real-life magician!’

At this point, her mother had turned away, back

WRITTEN BY THOMIS BRIDE

But there was. In the middle of the mall that day, at the heart of a crossroad between the different stores, there was a magician. At first, all Emily saw was that a crowd of shoppers had massed around something that wasn’t a store; she was too small to see what it was. And that was all it took to ensnare her curiosity.

She pushed her way into the throng, weaving through the forest of gangly adult legs, until she saw him. Most magicians wore a tall top hat, usually concealing a pretty bird. This magician’s hat was quite different; it was red and flat, and sagged to the side like a sack of potatoes partly hanging off a benchtop. There was no sleek black tuxedo; this magician simply wore jeans, a flannel shirt and a lustreless navy waistcoat. Emily thought it was a strange outfit,

into busying herself with the dishes.

even for someone as strange as a magician.

‘Ok sweetie,’ Emily’s mother dismissed.

But this was no ordinary magician. There

Emily grew hot at her mother’s attitude

clad assistants. The magician simply used a

towards her news. She didn’t believe her. She thought she was just being a silly little girl.

‘He had a wand!’ Emily blurted out, to prove her case, ‘And he even wore a funny hat!’

‘What makes you think he was a magician?’

And her mother thought she was being silly.

‘Because he was doing magic, mum!’

‘There’s no such thing as magic, sweetie.’

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were no rings, dunk tanks, birds or scantilycanvas on an easel. The wand the magician used looked like an ordinary paintbrush when Emily first saw it. But the magician used the wand to do things that Emily didn’t think were possible.

take her. But the moment the canvas came

stores. The more you stared at them,

into view, her speed evaporated. Her strides

the more shining triangles and

gradually became shuffles, and eventually she

squares you could see within

grinded to a halt. She stood there, gawping.

them, collapsing infinitely

Had her jaw not been attached to her head,

into an impossible depth

it would have been scuttling across the floor

inside the stone. The

by now.

by walking around

Mostly with their fingers, but sometimes with

it, without moving or

brushes. A quarter circle line of yellow in the corner was enough for the sun. Curly blue lines for ocean waves. A red square with a triangle on top made a house. She had seen one kid mix some of the colours into grey to paint jet planes. But she had never seen someone use paints and colours like the magician did.

The image upon the canvas was an emerald horse. Not of the shade, but of the stone. A rearing stallion that shone as if carved from the scintillating mineral itself. It glittered before Emily’s eyes, yet the image was completely static.

It was not real, but somehow it was the most real thing she had ever seen.

She had learned about horses

touching the stone. The horse upon the canvas glittered the same way.

A nd the magician was making it glitter with his wand disguised as a paintbrush.

Emily was smart enough to know that some magicians weren’t actually magic. Some were frauds; tricksters swathed in snazzy suits. They used sleight of hand, devices and other theatricality to try and fool those they entertained. But the magician in the mall had nothing to hide. Emily watched him like a hawk, but he simply swished and flicked away. Besides a canvas, an easel and a wand, there was nothing to see.

Except pure magic.

at school. Their coats were

‘Yes there is, Mum,’ Emily responded with a

of many shades; mainly a

grin. Out of her pocket, she drew the very wand

variety of calm browns and

the magician had used, which he gifted her

greys, sometimes even

after finishing his magic.

stark blacks and whites.

She knew these coats

And some day, I’ll be a magician too.

were of smooth hair and not shining gemstones, and yet the horse upon the canvas was of

facing the magician directly and couldn’t see

pure emerald.

loop of bystanders as fast as her little legs could

their own accord just

Sometimes they would paint at school.

Initially at the fringe of the crowd, Emily was what was on the canvas. She sped around the

shapes would flicker of

Emily had seen emeralds before, when her mother would take her shopping into jewellery STORY

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STRESS LEAVE

BY TAMARA HOLMES

2003

BY TAMARA HOLMES

The pumpkin vine grew from the compost in

You took me fishing as a kid, jealous

our backyard. It snaked beneath black

when my ten-dollar rod would catch a

plastic, extended itself over half dead grass,

stingray. You’d say, let me, and I’d sit

before readying itself to decompose.

back, hunched in my puffed yellow

Withered every exhale. Inflated every

life-jacket—buckle pulled to tighten.

breath. We watched from a distance, afraid

Threaded worm, head curled I used

to interfere in case our shadows stained

to play with them in the garden,

skin. Dad didn’t stay away. He went up

soiled hands palm up as they moved

every day for twelve weeks, dragged the

blindly in a motion sick stupor. I hated

green hose behind him as he walked the

the feel of fish scales, bumped flesh

length of the yard and stood —for an hour

slimed, gill gaping open as it

sometimes— and emptied tank water on

suffocated on air. You would throw it

fuzzed vine

in a bucket, tail flapped against

each hybrid

plastic like the water against our

compacted globe

floating tin. Forehead pinked, I’d lay

speckled green and

at the bow showered in salt.

yellow.

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POETRY

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I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y B R I T TA N Y F E N T O N

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I R I S GAR D E N S BY KO M O U S U S NON-FICTION

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REFLECTIONS ON A SWISS CHEESE PLANT

BY JANDI FLYNN The stomach swallows the tongue Swallows the lips and the love and the soil The stomach swallows the heart Swallows the tar and the ash and the soul

I do not want a kiss I do not want orange juice after brushing my teeth I do not want anybody, anything, anymore, anyway

I do not want up; I do not want down The stomach has poor self esteem The stomach is rot and mould and grease The stomach has no sense of time

Maybe where I am heading is the place where nothing is (I always hated people that said black was not a colour that instead it was a shade)

Maybe where I am heading is the place where nothing is

I hope to see you there

I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y H E YA I D A N

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NON-FICTION

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Then and Now: The Decline of the University Sector

The ‘golden age’ for Australian university-

got her places. Even though she went through

goers seems to have passed. University

the relatable unease of not knowing what

diplomas sit in cardboard boxes in the shed,

the future held for her, she was able to sit the

or sadly neglected on the walls of tiny offices.

public service exam and was rewarded with

Employers register lower satisfaction with

a full-time and well-paid job in a government

graduates, and increasingly it seems graduates

department. After three years of uni, my mum

have far fewer reasons to be satisfied with their

didn’t graduate with $43,500 in debt; which

uni experiences.

is what she would have to pay now under Dan

I see myself as one of the privileged few Australians with not one, but two tertiaryeducated parents. My mum and dad both came from regional families (read: whoop-whoop).

Tehan’s (who ironically graduated with a BA himself) scheme. It was free. The government paid for her to go to uni so that she could find gainful employment.

Mum was one of only 3% of her classmates

In 2020, Arts degrees are at best the butt of

who matriculated; let alone graduated. She

every half-hearted Stalkerspace joke. At worst,

moved to Canberra to attend ANU and study a

they’ve become a political tool used to argue for

Bachelor of Arts. But that was in 1975. Between

defunding universities. While universities are

the Vietnam War, the Iranian Revolution, and

at their death knells, begging for money from

the peak of disco, nobody called my mum a lazy,

far-right think tanks (see: UQ’s Ramsay Centre)

perpetual student, a social justice warrior, or

and the volatile exchange student market, the

any number of things those who study Arts are

fun fact Scomo won’t tell you is that two thirds

called now.

of all chief executives of ASX-listed companies

Back then, uni life was more than study. It was an experience. My mum lived on campus, found part-time work at a bar, and had government

have humanities degrees, alongside ten of Australia’s thirty Prime Ministers. They’ve had their go, but they won’t let us get ours.

aid to get her through without having to trade

Even if the modern student manages to survive

off between getting a 7 or affording the week’s

living off Centrelink below the poverty line and

groceries. Not only that, but her Arts degree

finish with a stellar GPA, there simply isn’t the

WRITTEN BY SARAH BALMER

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NON-FICTION

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same job guarantee waiting for us that my mum

Gone are the days where being a uni student

engagement. Just several hundred students

economic conditions. He expects us, like Atlas,

had. Some 54% of Humanities students report

was treated like a full-time job. We take a 45

sitting in a room or catching up on content

to carry the entire weight (in the form of fiscal

that the skills they learned at university didn’t

minute train in, go to a single class, and go all

online– and why not? There’s little discernible

debt) of the world on our entitled shoulders…

prepare them for their job or even to find a job,

the way back home because we can’t afford to

incentive to be present on campus when course

while he fucks off to watch the footy during a

leaving them with a massive debt to repay and

move out into share-houses. We skip through

content is stale, class numbers are inflated, and

national crisis. Maybe it’s less like pushing a

nothing to show for it.

the textbooks we had to buy at a premium

engagement is low. Is this really what tertiary

boulder up a hill for eternity, and more like a

because the university couldn’t afford more

education is intended to be? Is this really what

boot stomping on your face.

than three digital copies for a cohort of 600. We

expert academics signed up for?

It blows my mind that the education we pay for – and will begin paying more for very soon– is subpar to the education that my parents got for free. Long gone are the days where

watch online recordings of glorified slideshows that haven’t been updated in four years.

What the Morrison Government should not be

Education is so precious, so valuable, that it

contemplating is whether it should incentivise

is devastating to see it reduced to its current

certain courses, whether certain degrees are

my Mum sat in class and watched in awe as

Employers scoff at resumes where ‘all they

state. Our university system has been

obsolete, or whether STEM is more valuable

that week’s guest lecturer walked in; not an

have’ is a Bachelors with a high GPA, forgetting

commodified and corporatised. Everyone

than the humanities. Rather, the question

underpaid and overworked Masters student,

that they were employed with exactly that.

involved gets a shit deal. Students graduate

I want answered is if we’re getting anything

but Gough Whitlam. Fresh off being deposed

Both my parents got their jobs as soon as they

40k in debt, without having learned as much as

close to value for money now. Or value for time.

as Australia’s 21st Prime Minister. As QUT

graduated. Now though? 20% of graduates

they should. Lecturers and tutors fail to engage

Or intellectual value.

watched its big concert go down the drain last

report being under-employed, doubling since

with students in subjects they are more than

year, I was reminded of my dad as the president

2008. Employment is more difficult, and you’re

likely passionate about, as they aren’t paid any

of Deakin University’s Student Association,

in even more debt. Opportunities galore!

more for prep time due to the casualisation of

I think the statement “all that glitters is not

academic staff. Our workforce gets graduates

gold” couldn’t be truer than when applied to

who are underprepared, over-burdened with

our generation and to the university sector in

debt, and directionless.

which we exist. My law degree, which when

booking none other than Midnight Oil for a uni event. University used to be more fun. It was intellectually stimulating, and you felt like you were going somewhere. It also used to be free. Why is it that more than forty years after my parents began their university lives, mine is demonstrably worse? Why is it that university life for so many current students pales in comparison to what it once was?

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Now, that isn’t to say that I don’t have some amazing lecturers who work incredibly hard and are venerable experts in their fields. But

I believe the answer is a resounding no.

complete will probably have cost more than a

much of the content I get, even pre-pandemic,

I don’t know what the solution to this major

is entirely online and recycled from the

systemic failure is. What I do know is that

previous year. Many of my electives consist of

students should ignore politicians like Scott

We’ve been sold a lie. A really, really

only one two-hour lecture per week, called a

Morrison, who call young people lazy after

expensive lie.

‘workshop’ to skirt around the fact that there

having already benefited from a free university

are no tutorials or other opportunities for

education under completely dif ferent

house deposit, had better fucking glitter.

NON-FICTION

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WET CIGARETTE

BY JAK KIRWIN

CANCER CULTURE

BY MADISON BLISSET DE WEGER

the edification of doubt

I stare into this ceramic bowl,

i hate the way i am branded

even after the bristles

is a spent Marlboro bobbling

that has perhaps

as inspirational

grew long

like an oily dead fish

never seen a plunger,

based upon the scars

i never knew what to say

in a public toilet

as though it were a crystal ball

laced within my skin

when strangers asked about my scars

one thousand miles from

I ponder could the world

like my spine had a choice

i cannot bear those pitied eyes

light and sound

be saved, if only it

to carry the weight of its story

the ones suspicious

were bleached I see plumes of ash rise from

of high walls and manic mishaps i felt forced to pretend like

the eyes that breed my seclusion

the lungs of idle men

I read the names scrawled on the wall

everything was okay

waiting for the Earth to

visions of cemetery plots

delegating company for only

i envy your naïve faces

fix itself, like world leaders

there is a knocking on an OCCUPIED door

the good days

those who do not tremor

were rugby coaches

and with a flush

why was beauty so deeply ingrained

at the sight of a lone bump

and a change in staff,

and the buckling of a belt

that the shine of my skull

a bed-ridden week

training, and morale,

my doubts subside

and the tube up my nose

triggering déjà vu

was all we needed

we could all be saved.

was never allowed on show

of a time

to correct our course

locked away i am no longer willing to apologise

in my head somewhere

for failing to notice false claims of love and applause why would you linger in a place you did not want to stay why would you compete as if to prove you were humane

32

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POETRY

33

Maybe You Should Expect To Be Sexually Harassed”

TRIGGER WA R N I N G S E X UA L A S SAU L T

WRITTEN BY RUSTY FREE

I don’t typically write opinion pieces but I felt

‘wasn’t going to be very nice today.’ As a new

moved to write something on what has come to

team member with a very minimal role at this

light in the music industry recently.

stage, I don’t have a lot to contribute to the

In March of this year, when coronavirus was only a foreign thought, I was working

meeting and don’t expect to be involved in a lot of the conversation.

I’ve chosen to wear to work and suddenly my

How can one man do so much damage? Why

knees feel exposed. She says more about late

has no one called his behaviour out previously?

evenings and male expectations. She says more about how if she were me, she would quit this industry now. She says all this and no one says anything. None of the men in the room speak.

formal complaint, ‘43% said their claim was

closed toilet lid for several minutes doing my

ignored or not taken seriously.’

best not to cry. I try to speed up my emotional processing speed – process the guilt I have because I haven’t been sexually harassed, process the fear that eventually it’ll happen to me anyway, process the anger at her for making me feel like my body is a dartboard for the male gaze.

My boss was a very intense woman with a lot of hard-earned experience in the tech industry.

On the way to the boardroom where we were having the meeting (in a shared office space), she apologised to me in advance because she

34

GLASS

I sit very quietly behind the table while she points her finger at me and yells: ‘And Rusty you should expect to be sexually harassed.’ And I sit very quietly behind the table and underneath the wood my hands are shaking. My hands start pulling at the edges of my skirt – the first skirt

photographer sexually harassing them, pressuring them to do nude shoots, making sexually suggestive or derogatory comments, sharing explicit images without their consent, along with more disturbing comments and actions. If you want to know more (and I suggest you prepare yourself and ensure you’re

are falling apart, about how short my skirt is,

in a safe space - particularly mentally), check

and I think about how angry I am at a system

out Jaguar Jonze’s Instagram. Her recent posts

that methodically dehumanises and devalues

and highlights have more detailed information

the contribution of women.

on this photographer’s transgressions.

Months later I see a post pop up on my

This man did write a 3,000-word apology and

Instagram feed from Brisbane musician

I will draw your attention to one particular

Jaguar Jonze.

phrase that made me physically sick:

‘I’ve come across many predators who still

‘A history of oppression is what led to these

abuse their place of power or profile and

women never in the moment letting me know

manipulate the trust people, especially young

how they felt, never telling me to shut up or that

female musicians, have given to them. In the

they didn’t wanna do that look.’

about a particular male photographer who

been happening for weeks.

came forward with stories about the same

how nice this bathroom is, about how my shoes

with requests.

stands on the other side of the room.

Over a period of four days, 105 people

I sit on the closed toilet seat and I think about

event. During this period there was a team

Brisbane for a serious chat about what hadn’t

harassment pursued a formal complaint against the harasser. Of those who made a

last few days, I’ve been hearing so many stories

I sit very quietly behind the table while she

26.7% of people who were victims of sexual

a quiet exit to the bathroom where I sit on the

I sit very quietly in this meeting, quick to agree

from Sydney and Melbourne was called into

Harassment in the Australian Workplace, only

She leaves and a couple minutes later I make

with a company in Brisbane to produce an meeting. This was a big deal for us as the team

According to a 2018 ACTU survey on Sexual

works in the industry.’

I can say honestly, from the bottom of my heart: what utter fucking bullshit. There is nothing that pisses me off more than someone

Over the next few days I watch, with a mix

shirking accountability for their actions onto

of awe and horror, as Jaguar Jonze offers

something that is ‘out of their control’. Take

support for victims of sexual harassment in

accountability of your position in the system

the industry. She does so anonymously, so that

and if you’re a man: start calling this behaviour

she does not expose them to further suffering

out for what it is.

through defamation lawsuits or worse. The number of women coming forward goes up and up and up and up.

The truth is that I’m still expecting to be sexually harassed.

NON-FICTION

35

BUTTERFLY SLEEVES

BY SARAH BARFOOT

QUEER (ADJ.) TRISTAN NIEMI

the seams of my identity have been picked at

I place the silk upon the pattern of my being

and ripped at

each pin a gentle nick

panicked stitches sewn over top of destruction

holding me together

left behind cotton bird’s nests

I take the cotton thread of culture

beneath the surface of my skin

and share it with an empty bobbin

with each ‘harmless’ speculation comes the dissection of my lineage

with right sides together

my existence is not permission to run your

and patient deliberation

mouth like a blade

I create for myself new seams

slicing me into a percentage

rich with familial tales and my mother’s

maternal or paternal

mother tongue

I once played your games but now,

butterfly silk for a butterfly sleeve

I have unravelled into the depths of otherness

I backstitch over it again and again this thread cannot be pulled, or stripped

my body is laid flat and still

it will never give because this time

a delicate paper pattern

it is one hundred percent me

strikingly white against the walnut tabletop scissors snip along the middle, following closely along a clumsy line drawn in sharpie, and snickers, and overheard whispers

The Iclandic Rome Poem Queer (adj.)

Queer

The Icelandic Rune Poem

beautiful Black Trans-women and the forefront of revolution

Queer

and collective amnesia.

glittering souls and open hearts

Queer

and cause for celebration.

free from gender and dating in a different prison

Queer

and no femmes or trans only.

let’s have a kiki and throw shade

Queer shouted slur

and project our unhealed traumas.

and reclaimed identity and home for all.

Queer shining exterior and rotting interior and ‘it’s just a preference’.

Queer sex in the dark and liaisons in alleyways and a married man crying for help.

a butterfly’s ornate cocoon the fibres spun into silk and dyed the colours crimson red and royal blue a little bit of golden sun, but only to the left— the right is reserved for the stars white and bright, an eternal guide one that has left me lost

36

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POETRY

37

Bread & Circuses

TRIGGER WA R N I N DISCUSS G IONS OF VIOL ENCE

WRITTEN BY LAUREN MARSHALL

That is the one where people jump up on the

that the future of mankind would be a boot

ropes and run around in circles and hit each

stomping on a human face forever, each at

other with chairs. This one is the real one. The

the same time. By the time the referee called

UFC is real.’

the fight over and Yan had risen to celebrate,

His voice was kind and after hearing his friend reply in a Spanish accent that was as slow and deliberate as Line’s Portuguese-

The circus was over. Two Brazilian casualties would be added to those of the day, teetering

money spilling out of his head,’ after it became

ever closer to 100,000 deaths. Line had tears

unbearably obvious that his bet would not

in her eyes, not necessarily for Aldo or Andrade

be paying.

but for her beloved nation, for her mother and

As the cutmen smeared Aldo’s face with

There is beer and there is noise and there is a

this point whilst recounting the difficulties the

petroleum jelly – to prevent cuts and tearing

seventy-inch television mounted to the wall

UFC had in entering New York, the last of the

around the eyes, Andrei informed me – I began

broadcasting the UFC 251, live from Abu Dhabi’s

United States to lift bans on the mixed martial

to consider the old theory that all you had to

Fight Island. I’m here at Eagle Street’s Pig and

arts competition, when a New York Assembly

give a population to keep them docile was

Whistle with my Brazilian friend Line and

member declared that the UFC was little more

bread and circuses. Around me were all manner

her Russian partner Andrei – coincidentally

than ‘gay porn with a different ending’.

of people, with all manner of accents, reveling

fighters who we are here to see, the Russian Petr Yan and the Brazilian ‘King of Rio’ José Aldo – and I smell blood.

declared Namajunas the victor of the bout, the pub began to fill with patrons eager for the main event and the highly anticipated title fight

in the modern transmogrification of the bread and the circus, the beer and the sporting match. I also considered how significant it was that two of the world’s leading nations in terms of COVID deaths – Brazil and Russia – were

Having found ourselves drinks and seats,

that proceeded it. One such patron took up

we began to discuss the absurdity of Abu

residency within earshot– though graciously

Dhabi granting the blood sport that is the

he didn’t sit on me and actually jokingly

Ultimate Fighting Championship sanctuary

cautioned his female companion that she must

on its own private island. In a petro-city-

maintain a reasonable social distance from

state where women are unable to marry

Line, Andrei and I. This was the first reference

without the express permission of a male

to the pandemic that had come up since we got

Here is what I remember of the fight itself:

guardian, or to wear clothes that reveal their

to the pub, which was more or less haphazard

the synchronised oohs and the aahs of myself

legs to any degree that would be considered

in its own enforcement of those regulations

and my fellow spectators as significant strikes

immodest – against the backdrop of 80 lashes

drawn up under the auspices of a new normal,

were landed, the utter grace with which the

– it was dumbfounding to witness the steady

besides the implied and self-evident fact

combatants touched gloves between each of

pulverisation of Brazil’s own Jéssica Andrade by

that the UFC could no longer continue in the

the five, five-minute rounds, and the utter

the formidable 5’5 ‘Thug’ Rose Namajunas, each

Continental United States or indeed on any of

demolition of Aldo, who was taken down in the

clad in a UFC sports bra and trunks.

its oceanic properties.

5th and repeatedly punched in the back of the

Equally ridiculous was the prospect of sweat

The only other comments I heard from the

drenched, ripped to the bone, hyper masculine

gentleman for the rest of the afternoon were,

male fighters grappling one another against

firstly before the fight started, ‘no no– the

chicken wire in a nation where homosexuals

WWE you are thinking of, that is the fake one.

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GLASS

endlessly, like his own proud Amazon.

His other comment was ‘well fuck, there’s my

are routinely flogged and stoned. Andrei raised

After a somewhat controversial split-decision

out of a river of blood that seemed to stretch on

English, I felt with him a strange camaraderie.

I once again find myself in a den of fallen angels.

enough, these are the nationalities of the

Aldo’s team required a fishing rod to pull him

about to beat the shit out of one another, and that this conflict between two citizens of two of the largest countries on Earth, by both area and population, were to destroy each other in a gruesome display of their own superb health.

head for what seemed like hours but may have in fact been a minute. It was slow motion brain damage. I recalled the Simpson’s ‘stop, stop he’s already dead’ scene and Orwell’s declaration

her father in the northern state of Maranhão, for the rosary around her neck and it’s Christ.

For her Christ, for my Christ, for our Christ, for the Christ that left us two thousand years ago like a useless father to return to his useless father in heaven, and for us to sit now in an overcrowded pub drinking Japanese beer, waiting for the pale horse of Pestilence to ride on over the hill and never, ever, ever return to us. And it was then that I heard the gentleman say, ‘well fuck, there’s my money spilling out of his head.’

“Around me were all manner of people, with all manner of accents, reveling in the modern transmogrification of the bread and the circus, the beer and the sporting match.”

NON-FICTION

39

KNIGHT ERRANT

BY JARRAH L. BARTON

ODE TO STEFANOVIC

BY ARTHUR PARSONS

I have strayed far…

It is always something

One time I was watching news breakfast television

Further than I thought

More, something male?

And there was a story about a kid who was never absent

Was possible.

No.

From kindergarten to his final high school exams Not one day

I was once a knight,

No, mine anger pales

And they showed the kid and he was bright and radiant and immaculate

Though, no Grandmaster

In comparison to petty

Like pasteurised milk

Shone beacons across

Men and their lusts–

The fog. I grew

And yet…

Dishonest. Even cruel.

Doubt, dear knight,

Who had been in love for 78 years

The way became lost

Is the one thing

They had faces like porridge

In translation.

You can be certain

With brown sugar smiles

Then they showed another story About an elderly couple

They were so very happy When I turned my sword

Of, surrounded

To mine own skin

By reflections of flowers

Then I realised the news breakfast people had tricked me

It blistered reflecting

And women once loved;

It made me sad

My haggard face.

How do I know

Because they had shown me the same story

I had come so far

What is truth

Only to see

Or simply distortion

Then they introduced the next story

Someone else.

From the fauld?

About a baby billy goat

In two different ways

Who was best friends with a baby grizzly bear You asked me once

And they even had a video

When does the righteous

And sure enough

Anger become just

Here is a billy goat frolicking around this bear

Anger?

And the bear looked like he was smiling

Then I was reassured Ready for another day At school, at work, at love Another day Of dancing around the bear

40

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POETRY

41

Up and Down Praha WRITTEN BY NOLA HOANG

TRIGGER WA R N I N DISCUSS G IONS OF SEXU AL A S S A U LT

“My friend said I was drugged. I registered it in. He kept trying to hold my hand until I told him to stop touching me. The bartender came by to say they were closing. I said I was drugged. He said shit happens.”

My old friend was my Praha tour guide. First

work day– unsurprisingly at a weed store. I

at the city. I went to the Klementinum tower to

remembered. Another round came later. I

night I came we had a small stroll around

went my way strolling down the street, taking

look down at the city. I went to Vysehrad and

started talking to Nic/Nick. At one point, I

the centre. I came at a good time, where

pictures and checking out local stores. I found

looked down at the city. Then again, my friend

said I wouldn’t sleep with him. He asked why I

everything was opening but not many tourists

a chocolate shop where the shopkeeper offered

brought me to a hill far from the main streets

didn’t just kiss him. I said no again. And another

were rushing in. We went to Charles Bridge.

me chocolate tasting. We tried multiple kinds.

to look down at the city. There, he pulled out

no. I stood up and asked my friend where the

There were only a few couples walking by.

She gave me one piece and put another in her

his grinder and paper and rolled me another

bathroom was. I managed to get in and started

Twelve hours later I would walk on it again and

mouth. What an interesting job to have. I left

of his specialty.

throwing up. First time in my life, I threw

start having to ask people to let me through.

with a slight guilt of having eaten so much

Praha is old and beautiful. Buildings were

without purchasing.

After a day spent up high, we went to the bar

up alcohol.

down under. The Vzorkovna has a lot to offer.

It was not alcohol. My mind got dizzy. People

That night was the opening movie of Karlovy

A room with swings, a room with Foosball, a

started walking in and out and asking if I was

Vary Film Fest. Now that it was available in 96

room with a screen playing rock music and

okay. My friend said I was drugged. I registered

kinos across Czech, I was determined to go and

a guy headbanging, a room with a multiple-

it in. He kept trying to hold my hand until I

see. So my friend brought me to Kino Svetozor.

dead-keys piano, a room with bands playing

told him to stop touching me. The bartender

They offered movie tickets, souvenirs and wine

live music. We started our first round in the live

came by to say they were closing. I said I was

We sat by the Vltava, drank and talked about

cups. The movie, Babyteeth, was Australian.

music room. I tried to roll one for the both of us.

drugged. He said shit happens. I said I was

how we have been the last few months, or the

The main character was dying, trying to

Then we moved to the Foosball one and played

raped before. To which he said life happens.

last few years. I tasted the third cigarette of my

add more substance into her already over-

with some frequents. Then the swings room.

I chuckled. The moment I felt awake enough, I

life. I swore its filter made the beer turn into

drugged family. It was emotional. It was also

Then we took a little break, climbing up the

rushed out with my friend. I just knew the way

fruit juice on my tongue. Then it was decided

relatable. My friend unintentionally got on a

stairs where we bumped into a huge old dog.

somehow. We reached the door in minutes,

it was time to chill.

roller coaster. He was speechless. The audience

We pet him for a long while, until we went back

climbed up the stairs in seconds. I went to the

clapped in sad sounds. To this day, I still replay

for our last shots. There, we met a Russian guy.

couch, telling my friend if he had fucked me

preserved at the sacrifice of freedom. Their cobblestone streets, which met the outcry of my feet, luggage, and pretty much everything that can move on them, were also kept for the UNESCO certification.

Among the beautiful towers and streets and f lower-filled alleys, Praha also offers the multiple grass stores, absinthe bars and ephemera-seeking tourists. They blended into the morning’s bustling lines of people and reappeared in the evening when families with kids walked by, tired from keeping themselves attached during the day.

On our first full day, we went to see the Old Town Quarter. Then, my friend started his

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scenes inside my head. No matter how loving your family is, they are all struggling with something; money, long-lost dreams, their children, or sometimes Zoloft. We went back to my room. My friend decided to crash for another night, wasted from the weed, alcohol and the movie.

This guy is called Boulatz. He was really into my friend. He had a girlfriend though who was staying with him. He was also with a Columbian

at that moment, I wouldn’t have been able to move. I would just let it happen.

I woke up to my friend sleeping next to me.

guy called Elliot. At one point, there was his Columbian friend, Nic or Nick. They said they only met yesterday. Boulatz offered us a round of shots – unsurprisingly vodka. We talked a

The next day would be called viewpoints day.

bit in the piano room. I was pressing on the

My friend brought me to a spot to look down

dead keys, trying to play the only Minuet I

NON-FICTION

43

Review His Motorbike, Her Island WRITTEN BY LUKA KATIC

STILL S FROM HIS MOTORBIKE , HER ISL AND (1986)

Nobuhiko Obayashi is one of my favourite

Obayashi makes the film itself an integral

the way Obayashi blends colour with black-

filmmakers. While his 1977 cult horror film

part of how the relationship between Koh

and-white imagery, echoing old Hollywood

House is well known, the rest of his filmography

and Miyoko is told on screen. Early in the film

classics like Rebel Without a Cause (1955).

hasn’t had nearly the same kind of following.

Koh proclaims that ‘some guys have vividly

Placing the film in a 1980’s setting amidst of all

His Motorbike, Her Island is a lesser known

coloured dreams, but mine were always in

this ‘50’s iconography almost gives it a dated

romantic-drama from the director that I hope

monochrome’. The film follows this analogy,

quality, as though the film is reflecting on itself

to draw more attention towards. It’s centred

shifting from full-colour to black-and-white

the same way Koh narrates the memories of his

around Koh (Riki Takeuchi), a motorcycle

at a moment’s notice over the course of the

summer romance.

enthusiast who, after a series of chance

story. While it’s never clear if there’s a single

encounters, falls in love with a girl named

consistent and immediate reason for this

Miyoko (Kiwako Harada). His Motorbike, Her

technique, it complements the film in such

Island balances the free-wheeling spirit of

a wonderful and warm way. It flows with the

driving with the wind rushing past your hair,

emotions of a scene, placing the audience into

with the romantic in-the-moment embraces

the warmth of the relationship casually and

of love that you cherish in a relationship. It’s

immediately. The editing is similar, using jump

tender yet brash. Immediate yet self-reflective.

cuts in a scene to add an immediacy and energy

It’s something to remember.

to character interactions.

One of my favourite aspects of an Obayashi film

The film is bathed in a sense of nostalgia,

like House, His Motorbike, Her Island is the

is how he utilises the cinematic medium as a

reminiscing on a single, gorgeous summer

perfect movie to wrap yourself up in a blanket

storytelling tool. The aforementioned House is

of love. It borrows iconography from 1950’s

to and explore what this great filmmaker has

hyper-energetic and varied in its presentation

American greaser culture, all the way down to

to offer.

to make the film itself feel like a haunted house

the films focus on motorbikes and those sweet

ride. Similarly, with His Motorbike, Her Island

leather jackets. This goes hand-in-hand with

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With Obayashi’s passing away earlier this year, his filmography seems to have had a recent resurgence in popularity – at least in the social circles of this pretentious film student.

Although many are still not widely available on streaming services or DVD, I hope my recommendation of His Motorbike, Her Island has inspired you to check out Obayashi’s films.

While it’s not as crazy or experimental as films

REVIEW

45

The Grimy and Shiny of this World WRITTEN BY IRIS STALLS

with fears of the slightest mistakes. At my

This need to run towards perfectionism,

internship I would mentally beat myself for not

the need to conform, all stemmed from my

contributing to office conversations, believing

fear of judgement. OCD feeds on fear like a

I was too quiet and lazy. I would wander home

bloodthirsty shark; it relishes it. Society’s

and replay the conversations in my head for

mentalities in dealing with taboo and

hours, lingering on every possible combination

discomfort don’t help. It’s why my head repeats

and permutation to rectify illusions of apparent

the same phrases it has been for years. My

‘issues’. Irrational thought processes I had

whole life I’ve been taught that I’d be shunned

lugged around in my head for years began

or punished for faults, or for presenting any

to unveil themselves daily. I was fearful

slither of an independent viewpoint. Like many

of judgement and of ‘thinking differently’.

people, taught to just brush away the grime

For days, I couldn’t leave my bed without

instead of seeing it form the diamond. That’s

contemplating for hours the solutions to

where the addiction to perfection begins,

problems which weren’t even there in the first

that’s where we are conditioned to only present

place. I scrambled for answers to my illogical

this shimmery life to society.

thoughts from family members, hoping their responses returned in the same wording, tone and pitch. The fear of failure seemed to haunt my existence, which was why I had strived

In moments of clarity, everything makes sense to me. I’ve made a decision. I will try my best to live my life without irrational fear. Grime can

I had been working two jobs and an internship,

I was nineteen when I realised I had been living

all while studying full-time at university. I

with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and

remember my excitement and eagerness

anxiety my entire life. Years of obsessing over

entering the semester. Finally, I was going to be

my grades eager to find the right answers,

When I received the diagnosis, it was clear

process of pressuring those ingredients must

a big shot, a somebody. I would be the brightest

reciting speeches at least three times a day to

the first port of call was therapy; I’d be given

be seen to appreciate its true beauty form. I

glimmering diamond amongst stones. I would

ensure superbness, my sentence repetition for

outlets and strategies to remove the ‘dirt’

will live my individuality to its fullest and trust

be praised as the image of success. Now looking

validation and security had become illogical. I

circulating my mind. This seemed easy. An

that I can take on any challenge I face. I am

back, there’s irony in observing who I was in

just didn’t realise my mindset had an attached

OCD clinic was the most logical solution, right?

a somebody. I’m growing still; the diamond-

the past. I seemed like a completely different

medical condition. It took until the end of the

Well, apparently not according to relatives of

making process is a life-long endeavour. And

human being, one who had no idea who the hell

semester to appreciate this, so you can imagine

mine, who turned to me and said ‘make sure

that’s ok. I have been a glittering diamond

she was to become in six months.

how difficult university was.

you park a block away from the clinic, we know

gleaming in the light this whole time. I just

people around that area’. Anger grew thicker,

had to know it.

for perfection so exhaustingly for the past twenty years.

I’d always thought I was ‘Type A’, so to speak,

When life didn’t go as planned, I crumbled,

but never did I think for a minute it was

scrambling to find security. This would only be

something of the mentally ill. My constant

behind closed doors of course, because seeing

obsessive thoughts, rational and irrational,

a ‘successful person’ fail would be horrendous

never bothered me. I lugged my coping

for the image I tried to portray. I wanted to be

mechanisms to these thought anxieties

a ‘diamond in the rough’, the individual who

around in a large emotional suitcase. How I

worked tirelessly to achieve large ambitions.

coped then is something I find truly amazing. I

I never expected the grime which formed the

I had a revelation at this point. Many of us

always strived for perfection, believing success

diamond itself to be so dirty. I never realised

enjoy avoiding grime because we are taught it’s

meant reaching excellence. With this mindset,

the price of that diamond would be my mental

embarrassing and awkward. We’re unsure of

I did achieve my goals. I was excessively

wellbeing. As my jobs grew increasingly busy

what emotional mechanisms to use in dealing

determined. Some would call it stubbornness,

throughout the semester and uni piled on

with it.

but determined is more idealistic to me.

the assignments, my OCD became infatuated

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only be seen as weakness if one sees their own ‘griminess’ that way. We forget that dirt, dust and grime craft a gleaming diamond, and the

rooted in the pit of my stomach. I wanted to yell and punch the closest wall. But what would that do? What would that achieve? I was supposed to hide the insufferable grime and present a glittery, shiny diamond to the world, simply because ‘people may talk’.

NON-FICTION

47

ALLEGORY OF CAPITALISM

BY GEORGIA SANDERS

TWENNY TWENNIES

BY GEORGIA SANDERS

The genius of the beast

Her wings broke as she split the sky

war, famine & revolution

irradiated truth

Is the way her scales shine

Leaving man to crawl still blind

i’m a ballerina

scalps worth pennies on the dollar

And reflect back on you

But now and then she returns to him

with lovely broken legs

busts of tyrants outside town halls

The dream of some divine

Through her offspring in his mind misplaced hate and chalk-faced lust

Nostradamus Press

rape the stateless mind

today’s headlines;

The beast has bled and suffered true

She dictates his path

There’s scars across her breast

She draws her heroes from a hat

But she hides beauty in her pain

And when the last days pass

justice, overslept

twins born without eyes

And wisdom in her nest

She swears to slither back

while the kids were

drunk monkey falls from tree (twice)

smoking clovers

eagle chokes on burger

Copper coils through her neck

The foolish men will heed her call

The beast presents her wear to me

The wisest may only run

anarchists finally free from their closets

Her serpent tongue beckons the weakest minds

But no doubt she will catch them all

from their chains, from their haircuts,

god is born, a beautiful

Who are consumed with glee

And cage them in her lung

tattoos, black beanies, and little red books

baby girl, in an

With many horns and many eyes

Then the darkness will return

life is no longer the worlds reserve currency

She sees in all degrees

And her kind shall rule the Earth

plagues of the senile,

hope is elsewhere

Looking through the forest now

She will dance like water falls

like gulls, pinching youth and art and beauty

we may never find it

Her tail flattens trees

As the sky softly burns

hot off the sand

bear scratches dragon’s back

empty church

a dog barks on mars Her head stretches from the West

She will shed her shrivelled skin

flowers wilt, despite affection

with no one left

For in her self-defeating feast

With the glory of rebirth;

while mama was

to smell his shit

She snaps her back around the globe

Will breathe her sickly kin

drinking 24-hour news

Her belly grumbles in the East

As they spread their joyous dearth

Born in pre-cosmogonic dawn From an egg beneath the sea She spilt up her acrylic guts To set the man form free

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POETRY

49

Always Was Always Will Be

My mother asked why Indigenous Australians

combative force, the death toll is estimated in

refrain from celebrating Australia Day.

the millions.

But she already knew the answer. She

The Bangladeshi Liberation War is burnt into

remembers the earthshaking sound of bombs

the backs of eyelids of an entire generation who

dropped from overhead planes becoming

were alive in the 1970s. But we were the victors;

louder and louder. At barely two years old, my

we reclaimed our language, our nation, and our

mother still believed that my grandmother

collective identity as Bangladeshis.

knew and could do everything, and clung to her knees for protection. (We won’t die, will we?) My grandmother counted prayers on her tasbeeh, the Islamic version of rosary beads. She had no disillusions about her morality. (Even if we die, we will meet again in the afterlife.)

The violence was calculated. They first murdered the academics, doctors, and educators to eradicate any chance of the nation recovering or progressing. Their next step was comparatively indiscriminate with a single objective: they slaughtered anyone with P H O T O G R A P H Y B Y FAT I M A H Z A H R A B U K S H

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WRITTEN BY RAMISA RAYA

Bengali on their tongue. Even with fighters, protesters and other military personnel as the

Imagine the reversal of history where the Bangladeshi Liberation War ends with Pakistan’s victory. And imagine their day of victory in this alternative history celebrated; for Bangladeshis to be called to celebrate a day marking the systematic genocide of our people, erasure of our mother tongue, and the violent conquer of our land.

The entire nation rejoices annually on this day.

The blazing barbecue steaks drown with ice soda on the outskirts of Brisbane. Pavlovas, Vegemite and lamingtons. Flags of red, blue and white wave vigorously.

Could you bring yourself to celebrate?

NON-FICTION

51

All That Glitters Is Not Gold WRITTEN BY JASMIN GRAVES The scramble for existence rarely leaves space

pedestals due to their image as portrayed on

for the inspection of the arbitrary. Oscar

a platform can be arbitrary. Vulnerability is

Wilde’s anti-Aristotelianism proclamation that

necessary to the human condition. It has also

‘life imitates art far more than art imitates life’,

been the first thing to disappear in pursuit

meant as a critique on realism, can be applied

of an aesthetics-based goal in in the age of

to many arbitrary values of ‘art’ in life today.

the internet.

To project this premise onto a modern day understanding of being and prestige, we can discuss how arbitrary perceptions can hinder the functioning of our social world.

Amongst others, one of the victories of the 21st century Wilde could not have foreseen has been the emergence of online social platforms. The irony of making arbitrary prestige accessible to the masses whilst commodifying that prestige has not been lost on me.

To criticize the arbitrary value of prestige, I want to make the analogy of ‘online social platforms’ as artwork. During my mid-teens, it was a popular pastime to recreate the images or aesthetics of our favorite celebrities on social platforms. We would curate a background, re-tell a joke or edit in post-production any blemish or inconsistency to get the perfect,

It became a self-fulfilling prophecy that those creators we held to high esteem, may only be prestigious because we believe them to be.

A concern over this is, the more unattainable or inauthentic an image becomes, the greater the steps necessary to replicate its aesthetic appeal. Life imitates art and life will wither in the pursuit of art.

Thankfully, I no longer pursue the replication of images of internet-celebrities. Partly due to prominent figures speaking out in support of authenticity, a visitation of the realism Wilde rebelled against. However, on a macro-level we’re all still keeping up with the Joneses, purchasing items we have no need for and pursuing career paths we do not yearn for to chase an image of success.

effortless candid. Our images, whilst poor

So much of what is perceived to be true of

replicas of real life, were artistic pursuits.

the populous is exact thing created by the

The constructed image portrayed by oneself on

I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y H E YA I D A N

populous in exploration of truth.

social platforms can at once be an exaggeration

To question our hegemonic ideals is a violent

of who one is and also a reinvention of the self.

act, to deviate from them is art.

Following this, the placement of people on

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ESSAY

53

Pure Until Proven Filthy

“An external jurisdiction cannot fill an internal need.”

WRITTEN BY EM READMAN

I remember first being introduced to the

we cast our ballots. It does not wait at the door

before I could even comprehend what being

layers of shame I had picked up in classrooms

concept of purity. I was in primary school and

when we step into a doctor’s office. It cannot be

sexual meant. I was taught to love myself,

and schoolyards and churches and bedrooms.

my class was sitting down for show and tell.

swatted with a protest sign. It pervades, along

to respect myself, and that meant that I was

You cannot be judged by a system you are not

We were in a circle, cradling family photos

with shame.

expected to subscribe to this idea of purity,

a part of.

and seashells and fairy barbies that had interchangeable wings. When our teacher turned to the circle, she told me to close my legs and sit like a lady. I asked her why and she said that was the way things were and not to talk back. For the rest of that class, I wondered

I did not see myself as a sexual being in that classroom. I did not see myself as capable of

acceptance is difficult. It requires work, and

discovering preferences. There should be an

constant self-affirmation against systematic

wanted to tell them that I saw a stingray.

unadulterated joy when discovering your body

shame. In doctor’s offices and police stations,

and its sexual agency. There should be love and

schools and universities, in legislation and

pleasure and choice and consent. Not shame,

parliamentary floors and the streets we protest

not the idea of virginity as a prize, not being

on; shame needs to be examined and criticised

told you were asking for it.

and pulled apart at the seams. Women’s

potato sack dresses were the problem. Some

their echo rings on over a century later. This movement, aiming to restrict prostitution and contraception and other sexual activities, was consumed by the politics of sexual ethics and the regulation of bodily autonomy. As the decades sprawled on, the ideas that correlate virginity and purity calcified, as did the notion that bodily autonomy does not belong to the woman who inhabits the body. Some of the most stringent issues that grew out of the social purity movement have been combated with the infamous waves of feminism, asking for votes,

mornings, our principal would line us up holding a ruler and measure the distance between our dress hem and our knees. We’d

It takes years to unlearn shame. As years past,

be told to rehem them if they were too short.

and I became an adult woman, I felt a need to

One girl, a star netball player, wore the longest

justify my actions. In any situation, I wanted

dress available - unhemmed - and it was still

to outline all the reasons I was still pure -

inappropriate. When our principal said that

third date, nice person, consent - I wanted

girls are distracting the boys and teachers, I

someone to tell me I had done everything

asked if that meant she thought grown men

right. Unwillingly, I clung to social purity as

were really being distracted by underage

something someone, some other person, could

girls. She said I didn’t understand her, and not

decide. When other people decide your sexual

to talk back. We were beautiful young women

value, shame will always persist. An external

and were to act appropriately. We should be

jurisdiction cannot fill an internal need. With

ashamed of ourselves for sewing our skirts

time, I stopped asking for permission to be a

higher in 30 degree heat.

person with sexual agency. I stopped referring

and abortions, and to not be murdered. But

My body became an inherently sexual place

purity persists. It does not wither away when

back when I was a child. It became sexual

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GLASS

facets of women’s lives, because radical self-

of a recent beach holiday to show my class. I

purity, unaware of shame.

by the concepts of Christian morality, but

Concepts of purity need to be dismantled in all

There should be a joy of exploring sexuality, in

In highschool my legs were closed, but the

the 1860’s to the 1910’s, highly influenced

as a woman.

purity or impurity. I was a child, with pictures

what was wrong with my legs, unaware of

The social purity movement was active from

to submit myself to the shame of being seen

to pure values as my standard of ethical

bodies need to stop being policed, and men in powerful positions need to listen to women.

Shame stops women from expressing their agency and walking home at night. Purity still pervades conversations about anatomy and sexual health. Our current approach to purity still leads us to thinking that other women are sluts or whores or prudes because they make different decisions to our own. When purity is unravelled, so is the need to make decisions on who is pure and who is filthy, because the concept ceases to exist. When we lift the weight of purity, our bodies become homes, not courtrooms.

behaviour. I shed the layers and layers and

NON-FICTION

55

The Sound Of Silence (CONTINUED)

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WRITTEN BY ANAHITA EBRAHIMI

This is the last time I’ll come here. It doesn’t

droplets on her slender nose. I want to be angry

take me long to find the box, my box, and I

but I can’t. Part of the job is to let them find

notice it’s been taped up. The brown tracks

peace. No more strings attached.

wrap around a few times over as if they’re asking you whether it’s worth your while to

--

make the journey to the kitchen for a blade.

There was a conversation at the dinner table,

It’s not. I run my fingers over my name. Louise

way back when I was in year 10. I was angry

has scrawled it there as if she couldn’t bear to

because my parents didn’t let me go to an

look at the letters forming under her pen; it’s

all-boys school’s dance. There were other

almost indecipherable, like a mistake, a blemish

things too, like how my mum hadn’t spoken

on the carboard.

to me for five days because I lost her favourite

When Louise would take her glass of wine

pilling comb.

and sit in the garage amongst the rubbish

My mouth still full, I started. ‘When I die, I’m

and the old stuff she wasn’t there for the

going to visit everyone in this house and spook

‘good times’. I would watch, sit next to her on

them.’

the cold concrete. She didn’t see me there. I caught her once looking at a family photo – yet

My brother retorted, ‘ghosts don’t exist’.

another ruined by my scowl and crossed arms. I

‘They do. You can’t always see them, but they

watched as she covered me with half her hand,

can mess with you’. Taught to me by YouTube

sure I caught a flicker of a smile.

and the Paranormal Activity franchise.

Sometimes she would go through my old

‘I don’t think I’d notice’, he replied.

assignments, mainly English essays with wild ideas, just to remind herself that I was different – an anomaly not made for a mother’s love. She wanted to trace back to where it all went to wrong. I come here and I stand where she stood, I sit where she sat and I press on my eyelids with my fingertips the way she used to when I spoke too much. There is something about the way she looks at my pictures and reads my old letters - it’s not blissful reminiscing, there is no geniality to the way her eyebrows pinch in

Louise grinned and poured herself another glass of lemonade.

I put more food in my mouth and started to chew, ‘Mrs Hamilton said to us that outliving your child is one of the most traumatic things an adult can go through’. Louise closed her eyes and pursed her lips. ‘Also, there’s no word in the dictionary for a parent who loses a child. Like if Dad died Mum would be a widow, but if I died, nothing would change.’

the middle and her glasses slip with the sweat

STORY

57

A Dream is a Wish

WRITTEN BY ASHLEIGH NORTH

“What good was it, thousands marching through the streets, when all it took was the big factories to pack themselves away, move to distant shores and leave them all to pick up the rubble.”

There were so many people Tarra could barely

ballet shoes and Special Fairy Things. It was

‘Look closer,’ she’d said gently. ‘Don’t you see

When they’d come, she would tell them about

see the factory. She stood on her toes amidst

important work, Allo said. It must have been,

the magic in your eyes?’

the workers who earned too little to feed

the press of bodies, trying to peer past the

Tarra had thought, because every night when

press of onlookers. Some of them were in their

Allo came home she’d collapse into the kitchen

bedclothes, holding each other and scanning

chair as if making it to bed was one step too

the debris; pressing their clothes to their

many on her tired feet.

faces as the thick dust settled in around them.

They were weeping. A woman nearby wailed openly. Her keening cry was like nothing Tarra had heard before, like something animal. She threw herself against the cement as though she couldn’t hold herself up anymore, grasping at her sharee. Tarra felt her mami’s hand tighten around hers, felt her skin slick with worry. But her mami didn’t weep. She stared resolutely ahead, seeing nothing.

Tarra wanted to slip away like some of the crowd had done, clawing at the rubble, shifting through discarded fabric, toys and polyester American flags. She wanted to look for her sister amongst the people they were carrying out. All she could do was kick her feet and scan the ground around her. Where was Allo? Was this really the dream factory her sister had told her about?

Allo said the factory was special, like the movies they saw together before Allo was old enough to work there. She made shiny gifts there for little princesses around the world.

Delicate dresses in purple and glittering pink,

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Tarra wasn’t sure they were at the right place; Mami must have been mistaken. This didn’t look like a place dreams were made. It was all thick concrete, surrounded by identical grey buildings with many floors. But Mami said it was here, that the roof had come down and Allo was inside, and her face was so grim Tarra had to believe her. Tarra imagined the grey walls crumbling, spewing out clothing, machinery and people into the smoggy daylight.

Once Allo had brought home a tiara from the factory, like the ones princesses wore in the movies. Tarra had never imagined herself as a princess, and when Allo slid the piece gently through her hair, she’d eyed herself in the mirror skeptically. She pulled at her brown locks and tapped her feet disapprovingly.

‘It doesn’t look like Tinkerbell,’ she accused.

But her fingers lingered on the sparkling plastic and the corners of her mouth pulled up into a smile. Allo had grinned and kissed her forehead. She sang her that song: ‘a dream is a wish your heart makes…’

‘No,’ Tarra whispered now. All she saw was Allo’s eyes last night, heavy with the workday.

She glared at the rubble at her feet. ‘Give her back,’ she whispered. ‘Give her back!’

themselves when they left the factories, and the ones like Allo who had gone, or whose broken bodies left them on the streets once they’d outlived their use. Then they’d know, Tarra thought. Then things would get better.

What good were wishes, Tarra thought, when

They could make the buildings stronger, so

it was Allo that manufactured them from the

they wouldn’t topple down.

cramped factory floor, sending them away with a kiss to other little children in faraway countries. What good was it, thousands marching through the streets, when all it took was the big factories to pack themselves away, move to distant shores and leave them all to

And when Allo came back, she could sing again in the living room. Tarra could tell Allo her eyes were magic too, not just her working hands.

She’d give her older sister her own tiara, and they would be princesses together.

pick up the rubble.

Tarra thought of heroes she knew from movies, of their daring rescues and Herculean feats.

Why would they leave? Why did no one save Allo, after all the work she did keeping their colourful capes and sharpening their princely weapons? The people on the streets called for change, for better wages; but Allo couldn’t see anyone there to listen.

In 2013, The Rana Plaza building in Dhaka, Bangladesh collapsed, killing 1,134 factory workers and injuring 2,500 more. Disney merchandise, alongside items from other fast fashion brands, was found amongst the rubble. Changes have been hard fought for in Bangladesh. There is still a long way to go, and as the tragedy at Rana Plaza fades from global consciousness, workers’ rights around

They didn’t know, she’d hear later. Someone

the world continue to be at threat. Now, many

forgot to tell them. So she’d curl up, clasping

workers are at risk of starvation and destitution

the tiara in her clammy hands. She’d close her

due to factory closures during COVID-19.

eyes and try to reach them, try to tell them to

Please consider researching and supporting

come back and help her find Allo again.

movements such as labourbehindthelabel.org.

STORY

59

Anthem 60

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WRITTEN BY AMY SARGEANT

PERFORMANCE, 4 HOURS 35MIN

Anthem (2020) is a long form sound performance which appropriates the Australian National Anthem to produce motifs evocative of the devolving chaos and rising authoritarianism of Australia’s politics. The work is produced in response to the Institute of Modern Art’s provocations ‘Industrial Actions’ and ‘Unprecedented Times’, asserting the importance of critical reflection and political resistance in the current moment.

In the time of COVID-19, the obstinate failure of our leaders to communicate clearly has triggered confusion, complacency and violence toward frontline workers. With a reactionary zeal, our leaders have blamed these outcomes on the public. Michael Bradley writes that “the roots of that reflex lie much deeper; they can be seen in every step…taken down the path of authoritarianism since September 11, 2001. In this moment of deep crisis, it is flourishing” (2020)¹. In response, Anthem (2020) deploys the Situationist method of détournement, by which components of culture are recycled to produce new arrangements as a weapon of class struggle. Détournement is applied in this work through the appropriation of sonic and visual motifs from Australia’s political spectacle, to subvert nationalist motifs and challenge the dysfunctional spectacle. ¹Bradley, M. (2020). Welcome to a brave new world, where citizens have to prove their innocence.

SPOTLIGHT

61

PHOTOG R APHY BY RHET T HAM M ERTON FOR IMA

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NON-FICTION

63

Muddied Waters

‘Raabia,’ she had said, ducking her head and laughing, her shoulders shook and she had covered her mouth. Your name had never sounded more beautiful.

You were six when Munashe first came to the house. The old worker had died of AIDS and

WRITTEN BY AALIA HUSSEIN

You stare at the candle. Picture it. A lone white

she appeared when her father called for her.

candle glued to the middle of a saucer. The

You watched her as she waited patiently for

room is cool, winter is not here, not yet; the

her turn to receive the neighbour’s water.

wind creeps in from the windows and tickles

You watched as her eyes sparkled as she saw

the flame. A single flame sits atop the white

the water. How long had it been since you all

tower, flicking side-to-side to evade the wind’s

had seen running water? Three days? Four?

relentless fingers. Its heat melts the wax until

She looked up then and for a moment you saw

white tears dribble down the sides.

yourself in those eyes. Beautiful eyes. You

You place your head on the table and the

looked away.

candle startles. It whips to and fro in a frenzy

The neighbour is nearing forty and rich and

of orange before settling into a soft sway. You

his eyes always follow you. There is a door

turn your head into your arm and you smell

that connects the neighbour’s house to yours,

your sweat faintly. You need a shower.

next to the worker’s hut. The hosepipe snakes

Your arms are tired from carrying the pot of hot water to the bathroom and back. Boil, carry, empty, boil. You are tired of bucket baths. Tired of carrying the pot. Tired of lifting the metal jug over your head and pouring steaming water over your body. You dislike the coldness, the

through the door and drips its water from the neighbour’s borehole tap. Precious water hiccups out, taking its time to fill the buckets gathered by the door. This is the task of the worker’s daughter, to wait all day until each bucket is filled before carrying it to the house.

dryness of your body when you sit in the tub.

You told her once. To call you Raabia. You

Your back aches from bending over the bucket,

called her Munashe after all. She hesitated, her

from carrying water for everyone.

mouth pulled down into a frown, her eyebrows

It is your duty. You are the oldest child, the firstborn, the firstborn daughter. So your

furrowed and her eyes looked worried. Lovely eyes. ‘But Meeseez Raabia, I can’t. It’s not good.’

mother says. You say it over and over in your

‘Why not? I’m the madam, aren’t I? So listen

head, it is my duty, my duty, my duty. What

to me,’ you said. She smiled at that, teeth on

good are daughters who cannot perform their

display and eyes crinkling. You liked her best

duty?

when she smiled, she was the most beautiful

The worker’s daughter is dutiful. How quickly

64

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when she smiled; her eyes especially.

there was a need for a new one. Munashe was eight to your six when she arrived. Her eyes

waiting to unleash its wrath.

‘Come inside and study. Now.’ She gripped you by the arms and wrenched you from the ground. Her hold was a tourniquet.

The worker’s girl had to be forgotten. That was all your mother said. ‘It’s time to grow up, ma.

That girl…she is nothing.’

resembled an insect’s, too big for her little

You were fifteen, she seventeen. You sit in the

frame. You were the same height. She was

sandbox one last time and let her play with your

skinny but muscled even at that age, from

hair. She liked to marvel at the length of your

working in the fields at her kumusha you would

hair and wished her hair was as long as yours.

learn. She had no mother or brothers. She

‘We can’t meet anymore Munashe.’

attended the school down the road, the public one where all the other workers’ children in the neighbourhood went. You went to a private school.

‘But why Raabia?’

Onyx eyes glittered. Pretty eyes.

‘Missus Raabia. You call me Missus Raabia now.’

You played together in the sandbox behind the garage. You made sandcastles and would make a little moat around the castle. You planned adventures of going to the sea, of sailing on a yacht, of swimming with dolphins and finding treasure. You both had never seen the sea.

Your mother indulged in the playing. You were only children. When school was over for the day and homework was completed, you both snuck away to the sandbox behind the garage.

She would hide from her Baba, avoiding her cleaning and cooking duties; and you would hide from Ma, who screeched at you to study harder.

One day she was telling you a funny story from school. ‘Meester Shure farted in class. It was so funny,’ she couldn’t stop giggling about it.

Her eyes were lit up and, in the low afternoon light, looked like onyx stones. You reached your hands out and touched her cheeks.

‘Raabia!’

Your mother stood at one corner of the garage wall, hands on her hips. She looked like a storm STORY

65

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Editors Em Readman Anahita Ebrahimi Ashleigh North Jasmin Graves

Designer Aidan Ryan

Contributors Olivia Brumm

Sarah Balmer

Amy Sargeant

Jak Kirwin

Nina Busteed

Madison Blisset De Weger

Fatimah Zahra Buksh

Rusty Free

Savannah Barnes

Sarah Barfoot

Riley Baxter

Tristan Niemi

Benji Gorton

Lauren Marshall

Julienne Pancho

Jarrah L. Barton

Georgia Sanders

Arthur Parsons

Jack Roylance

Nola Hoang

Thomis Bride

Luka Katic

Tamara Holmes

Iris Stalls

Brittany Fenton

Ramisa Raya

Komousus

Aalia Hussein

Jandi Flynn

Rhett Hammerton

Glass QUT GUILD