cobalt (Jordie Albiston)

Co–nclusion: following find in 1982 by local sponge diver Mehmed Çakir & 11
campaigns {over 22 000 descends} the Uluburun drowned in the Mediterranean
Sea at the end of the 14th century BC {see golden scarab inscribed ‘Nefertiti’} &
amongst other treasures of this Late Bronze Age trove    a single ingot of pure
blue glass    proving such perfectness lasts     

          from Persia & Pompeii to Tang & Ming to the Congo & Zambia belt    you
          are my plenary blue    at rest upon fingers    tables of kings    you make love
          with eyes    make cats made of stone stare back    this is when I love you best  
          one stable isotope   11 meta states    a church where the Virgin locks out shock
          & we’re safe       but sometimes the door divorces its hinge & Kobold the Goblin
          gets a foot in    o wobbly-wobbly-precarious-psyche    stories packed with dirty
          bomb endings    everything starts to turn black    sometimes you weep    way
          down within & your tears fall silent like gamma ray ash    your grief can wipe
          out the world    sometimes you wail like a doomsday device    emit a steady sad-
          sad pulse    but you always mend & you always return    & you always remind
          no matter how hurt that “Mutual Assured Destruction” spells the word/world
          mad 


jordie-6806Jordie Albiston has published nine poetry collections and a handbook on poetic form.

Albiston possesses an ongoing pre-occupation with mathematical constructs and constraints, and the possibilities offered in terms of poetic structure. Her work has won many awards, including the Mary Gilmore Award and the 2010 NSW Premier’s Prize. She lives in Melbourne.