the woman in blue
all weathers
walks
like it’s killing her
ponchoed walker
orange flame spiralling
through long grass
she blows a trail of smoke
gently taps her ciggie
they keep her company
ash flakes float
the blushing moon
her cigarette burns
Lizz Murphy’s ‘The Woman in Blue’ Read More »
In the shop doorway
I ask him how his wife is
he tells me he is a champion
famous in his own land
How his daughter wants
to buy something
to put in front of her mother
to make her happy
Now he is able to say
tearfully
I am very worried
She is very sick
Lizz Murphy’s ‘In the shop doorway’ Read More »
Lizz Murphy writes poetry of people and place. Lizz writes in a variety of styles from prose poetry to micro poetry, often incorporating found text. Lizz has published 15 books; Bitumen Psalms is her tenth poetry title. Her previous collection The Wear of my Face (Spinifex Press) won the ACT Notable Award for Poetry (Big Press) 2021. Originally from Belfast, Lizz has lived in Binalong, rural NSW, for a long time.
About The Wear of my Face (Spinifex Press 2021)
Murphy’s eye for a truthful, pungent image is as strong as ever, and her gentle humour thankfully survives these strange times.
Read more in The Canberra Times.
— Penelope Wayland, The Canberra Times
From first poem to last, she invites us on a journey of realisation where we see fragments of a world that needs to be nurtured.
Read the full review in VerityLa.
— Hazel Hall, VerityLa, edited by Robyn Cadwallader
Poet Lizz Murphy’s latest volume The Wear of My Face is a literary manifestation of the photographer’s capacity to quietly observe – everything from the banal to the exalted is the stuff of her poetry. She writes so beautifully it makes me ache.
Read the full review in This is Canberra.
— Barbie Robinson, This is Canberra
The poems navigate life as it is lived, remembered or reported with breath-taking rhythm. Words dance, tumble, somersault and back-flip with exuberance, candour and humour.
— Dominique Hecq Rabbit 35 — Architecture
Trafalgar Place ruts in the road painted along the gutter All Drains Lead To Troy Gully and on Wirraway Close a dented No Through Road sign An old house was torn down leaving nothing but a jade plant like the stark withered tree outside Dan Murphy’s the corner of Windsor Parade There is manual labour and there is drinking and words within words Are you okay?
‘Trafalgar Place’ by D.G. Lloyd Read More »