New England Award and Highly Commended Poetry — Phillipa Trelford
Also Highly Commended in the Poetry category.
Phillipa Trelford is an author and freelance editor who has lived in Armidale since 2000. Originally from the central west region of NSW, she is a Communications graduate of the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) where she studied writing and performance. While based in Sydney she performed in contemporary Australian theatre productions and since moving to New England, has continued her creative practice through poetry and involvement with local writers’ groups. Her work has appeared in recent anthologies published by Poetzinc (Armidale) and PATP (Newcastle).
Phillipa Trelford is an author and freelance editor who has lived in Armidale since 2000. Originally from the central west region of NSW, she is a Communications graduate of the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) where she studied writing and performance. While based in Sydney she performed in contemporary Australian theatre productions and since moving to New England, has continued her creative practice through poetry and involvement with local writers’ groups. Her work has appeared in recent anthologies published by Poetzinc (Armidale) and PATP (Newcastle).
Chiaroscuro, Madgwick
An honesty in the wintering branches
arms outstretched
to the pinhole light,
not beggar-like
but accepting of all that has
robbed them.
Foliage tugged, torn from limbs,
scattered by gales.
Taunted by raw stealth and
the blight of frosts that colonised the dew.
Currawongs dive into mist
to raid hidden territories.
Swallows’ fractured nests
remain obscured
in the elbows of empty boughs.
Elms have relinquished gold leaf,
littered into wet cinnamon
around their charcoaled torsos,
their wound-gouged bark.
Woodsmoke engraves whispers
of the dying bright-dark minutes.
Branch-ends point gnarled fingers
to shadows retreating
deep into pockets
of cloaked night.
