The Vault

1. Friday evening, as my husband and I are getting ready for bed, I tell him I think I’ve fallen for a girl. That night we have passionate ‘I can’t ... Read More

Review by Lucy Alexander Edited by Robyn Cadwallader What if it was you who were woken by the crash of your door falling in the early hours of morning? Just ... Read More

What happens when poetry and art mix? Magic, that’s what! On 4 November 2018, twenty poets gathered to read their ekphrastic poems to a full and appreciative house at the ... Read More

Deadspeak Lycanthrope It’s that time of the month again: time to open the lowest drawer of the dustiest dresser. Sit awhile. Gaze at gauze enfolding precious. Peel it back, fingers ... Read More

Interviewer: Anthony Macris In his role as Professor of literature and creative writing at Western Sydney University, Anthony Uhlmann has spent much of his career writing about the connection between literature ... Read More

The Brindle Horses The brindle horses have been put out to pasture wearing their golden plumes. In certain light they appear as muscled apparitions out of a pop-up book for ... Read More

(edited by Kathryn Hummel) The plane takes off, confirming the entire row of seats is yours. All yours.               Closest you’ll come to owning property. ... Read More

for my father Inside my head are patterns a quilt of paddocks seen from the cockpit of the Tiger Moth the coastline is drawn in waves, crumpled like silk maps ... Read More

My elders, I hear them speak loud and strong with messages of culture and belonging. The essence of me. Who I am and who I’ll always be.  Proud. Strong. Aboriginal. ... Read More

i heat the stone until its eye opens invite its callus-scraped duct to extrude lava in sentences memory magma pushes through an axial sleeve from a thousand miles down to ... Read More

Fish Eye and The Mirror  He is thrown into a gap, down to the centre of the earth, opening like a womb down to the core of creation. And all ... Read More

Edited by Robyn Cadwallader In 2011, Phillip Hall was, in his own words, ‘offered the opportunity of a lifetime, to work in remote Indigenous education’. His collection of non-fiction poetry ... Read More

EILEEN CHONG: In this edition of the Verity La Poetry Podcast, Podcast Producer Alice Allan and Managing Editor Michele Seminara chat with Eileen Chong about her forthcoming book, Rainforest, out ... Read More

JORDIE ALBISTON: In this episode of the Verity La Poetry Podcast, Podcast Producer Alice Allan and Poetry Co-editor Robbie Coburn talk with Jordie Albiston about the relationship between poetry and ... Read More

it is silent my open door lets in a cool pre-dawn breath my husband is asleep everyone to the north south east and west of me is asleep i love ... Read More

I moved across from the hotel when I was seven years old and my mother gave me to her parents, like a late Christmas present, just before the New Year. ... Read More

The plane ascends. Women disrobe, crossing into Turkey’s airspace. Their hair cascades like waterfalls. I lift my skirt to let my legs breathe. So much sin is compressed between my ... Read More

As to the war souvenirs From Hugh to Ethel 7 November, 1943 Darling…If you must destroy the letters I suppose you must, but one day I thought we might write ... Read More

Edited by Robyn Cadwallader Eunice Andrada is one of many Filipino Australian poets who are together developing a distinctive, emerging presence in the national literary scene. The voices are diverse, ... Read More

Although I grew up in Australia, I was born in a rural part of Greece, in the region of Macedonia. The northern regions of Macedonia, Thessaly and Thrace were hit ... Read More

Suburbs now have their community gardens. Husbands buried there turn the pages of books abandoned because the heroine fretted too much to actually do anything. This ambition to compost sees ... Read More

Funeral plans: a wall crypt underneath her mother’s; pink roses on the pew ends. A house-size increase upon the exodus of children, husband, friends, dissention. Her disdain for the coverings ... Read More

Getting there This is the morning I wake from a dream of drowning, and wait for what comes next. Someone brings me tea I cannot drink, chocolates made of coconut. ... Read More

You can find my whole life in my poems, like a letter to God.  – Mohammad Ali Maleki Verity La and Rochford Street Press are proud to announce the publication of Mohammad ... Read More

I have the fortune and/or misfortune to be a cisgender woman, citizen of Australia and a writer. Variously combined, these elements have yielded some noteworthy experiences; made me a party ... Read More

Edited by Kathryn Hummel Forty days and forty nights: a biblical honeymoon for an interfaith queer couple. We begin in Bangkok on New Year’s Eve. Jetlag mixes with our hope ... Read More

(edited by Kathryn Hummel) To be having an adventure / is a sign of incompetence. ~ Anne Carson Gold Coast to Colombo Just before we get on the plane, my ... Read More

Juno Gemes: I searched for a printer in photogravure for over twenty years before finding master printer Lothar Ostenberg. The photogravure process, which sees photographs etched into copper and printed ... Read More

Braided Veins as we grow up as twins youd speculate this or that bully would probably grow to be bald & fat     i would laugh at the notion saying it ... Read More

Darting eyes flicker back and forth across a barren stage The gazelle prance in rapid motion One lower extremity present One lower extremity absent Shock waves at the barren amputee ... Read More

(edited by Laura McPhee Browne) Black on white. That’s how people see us. A splotch of black, spoiling the virgin white. It is my good fortune to have him, they ... Read More

almost me, almost you imagine you were meant to be half of two       but disturbance                 caused absorption a rush of ... Read More

(Edited by Laura McPhee-Browne) Once upon a time, I made a wish, an uncareful wish, in the Harder Laundromat. I wanted to throw a party for my students. Since September, ... Read More

Well I think we can all agree that 2020 has been quite the ride (and that’s putting it nicely!) This year has presented everyone — without exception — with challenges ... Read More

The trouble with having a doctor for a father is that you are brought up calling a spade a spade. Or more accurately a spatula a spatula, a scalpel a ... Read More

It’s the give of the earth: a shifting of clods under her running feet. Most of the children’s graves in the cemetery are marked with stones with names and dates ... Read More