Published 6 November 20246 November 2024 · Poetry TV Times Kate Lilley I try out for Can Can after school knowing I’m not cut out for the high kicks Ballads chansons show tunes ok I can belt out Judy Garland and all the songs from Oliver “Who Will Buy”/”As Long as He Needs Me” Wher-e-e-e-ere is love Showcase with Gordon Boyd is the highlight of my week “Ne me quitte pas” on a living room set with ikebana and lacquer If I were a rich man doo doo doo doo doo doo doo all day long I’d doodle doodle do Bounce my ball against the wall hula hoop until the midday movie synchronised swimming extravaganzas Glynis Johns playing teenagers into her 30s Maid Jean and Mary Tudor (spoiler: the New World inset is whole cloth) Suck it up and sing along that violin racket noone wants to hear it was the times fucking us up (that’s what they say now) rape was par for the course I used to believe it Aphasia hides my words gives them back in a different order dooryard’s unidiomatic (keep it that way) once the counting starts it keeps going try telling not telling what cannot be expunged take it from me A scene from Softly Softly jittery parkland setting a girl naked in high grass a low roar in the socket of branches there’s a trick to existing do not flicker set myself on fire burn it down Kate Lilley Kate Lilley is a queer poet-scholar. Her three books of poetry are Versary, Ladylike and, most recently, Tilt, winner of the Victorian Premier’s Award. Recent poems have appeared in Griffith Review, Australian Poetry Journal, Rabbit and Plumwood Mountain. She is the editor of Margaret Cavendish: The Blazing World and Other Writings (Penguin Classics) and Dorothy Hewett: Selected Poems (UWAP). More by Kate Lilley › 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 5 November 2025 · Poetry Force posture agreement Miroslav Sandev The men of Darwin have all taken their rottweilers / out for a walk at the same time. / For our protection. Like Pine Gap: / all those big white eyes that scan / the darkening horizon. / The eyes stay woke, so that we may sleep. / Or so they say. 1 22 August 202522 August 2025 · Poetry starmight K.A Ren Wyld Ending genocide and apartheid is the story. Palestinian liberation is the story. / Aboriginal rights is the story. Truth, justice, treaties and land back is the story. / Global Indigenous peoples’ solidarity and joy is the story. Kinship is the story.
