Published 6 September 20096 September 2009 · Main Posts a hungry alien, forced into a socially acceptable shell Maxine Beneba Clarke Melbourne writer Angela Meyer is the best and most exciting kind of Overload poet: a first timer! Tomorrow night, as part of the See What I’m Talking About event at La Mama Poetica, Meyer will perform poetry for the first time ever! Meyer, along with four other poets, will respond to photographic work as part of the Festival’s ekphrastic series of readings. Angela writes a regular literary blog for crikey.com, and her work has been published in Cordite Poetry Review, Page Seventeen, Wet Ink, and many other publications. She was also recently part of the Overland Progressive Writers Masterclass. The Melbourne poets look forward to her stage debut, and hope she sticks with them for a while. The Overland Overloaded team caught up with Angela in the lead-up to her performance: Who are you? A 24-y-o writer and blogger living in Melbourne. No, who are you, really? An eccentric, androgenous, obsessive, overwhelmed, expressive, hungry alien forced into a socially acceptable shell. What are you doing at the Overload Poetry Festival? I’m reading three pieces based on photographs, in the show ‘See What I’m Talking About’ at La Mama Theatre, Mon 7th September. No, what are you really doing at the Overload Poetry Festival? Watching Barry Dickins, Ben Pobjie, Briohny Doyle and the incomparable Sean M Whelan perform, then running away in fear and shame. Poetry. Why? Because I’m allowed to be moody and abstract, or irreverent, or postmodern, or metaphorical, or all of them mixed together. And I can be musical, without being a slave to structure. But seriously, I’ve written about 200 poems in my life and never shown anyone. I’m a fiction/nonfiction writer and reviewer. Now this. Are you crazy? I’m freakin’ nuts. Plug your event. Well, I’ve told you the date and time. Why should you come? Well, for the other awesome poets. And in terms of mine – I can promise pieces that cover secret islands, convergence, burning passion, hollow sparkler men and Bill Murray. Plug it some more. I might wear something low cut? Break it down… incessant thirst remains sticky-hair flask forehead burnt and cracked jacket without a torso his dark and crimson passion-vacuumed stain on my loungeroom too much for this Saturday I make pancakes Maxine Beneba Clarke Maxine Beneba Clarke is an Australian author and slam poet of Afro- Caribbean descent. Her short fiction collection Foreign Soil won the 2015 ABIA Award for Best Literary Fiction and the 2015 Indie Award for Best Debut Fiction, and was shortlisted for the Stella Prize. Her memoir, The Hate Race, her poetry collection Carrying the World, and her first children’s book, The Patchwork Bike, will be published by Hachette in late 2016. More by Maxine Beneba Clarke › Overland is a not-for-profit magazine with a proud history of supporting writers, and publishing ideas and voices often excluded from other places. If you like this piece, or support Overland’s work in general, please subscribe or donate. Related articles & Essays First published in Overland Issue 228 8 September 202326 September 2023 · Main Posts Announcing the 2023 Judith Wright Poetry Prize ($9000) Editorial Team Established in 2007 and supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation, the Overland Judith Wright Poetry Prize for New and Emerging Poets seeks poetry by writers who have published no more than one collection of poems under their own name (that is writers who’ve had zero collections published, or one solo collection published). It remains one of the richest prizes for emerging poets, and is open to poets anywhere in the world. In 2023, the major prize is $6000, with a second prize of $2000 and a third prize of $1000. All three winners will be published in Overland. First published in Overland Issue 228 8 September 202315 September 2023 · Main Posts Announcing the 2023 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize ($6500) Editorial Team Supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation, and named after the late Neilma Gantner, this prize seeks excellent short fiction of up to 3000 words themed around the notion of ‘travel’; imaginative, creative and literary interpretations are strongly encouraged. This competition is open to all writers, nationally and internationally, at any stage of their writing career.
