Published in Overland Issue 227 Winter 2017 · Uncategorized The Apology Day breakfast Ali Cobby Eckermann my mother did not grow up with her mother I did not grow up with mine my son did not grow up with me how does one define the jigsaw when the pieces are misshapen by the constant hands of others? the gift of life is maternity and the removal of this is a reparation that has no price the picture is askew in the portrait you offer and rejection is the new graffiti to rewrite the script you offer breakfast and forget I found my mother and rebirthed my son Together we are the Banquet Read the rest of Overland 227 If you enjoyed this poem, buy the issue Or subscribe and receive four outstanding issues for a year Ali Cobby Eckermann Ali Cobby Eckermann is a Yankunytjatjara poet and artist from South Australia whose work has been published and celebrated around the world. Her poetry collections include little bit long time and the award-winning collection Inside My Mother. Her verse novels are His Father’s Eyes and Ruby Moonlight, which won the inaugural black&write! Indigenous fellowship, the Kenneth Slessor Prize, a Deadly Award and was named the NSW Premier’s Literary Award Book of the Year. In 2013 Ali toured Ireland as Australia’s Poetry Ambassador, and in 2017 she received the Windham-Campbell Prize from Yale University.She describes herself as a dreamer, a gardener, with deep respect for her journey thus far. More by Ali Cobby Eckermann › 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 10 April 202610 April 2026 · open letter Open letter: RMIT staff and students oppose disciplinary action against Gemma Seymour over video opposing links to weapons ties RMIT University Staff and Students Freedom of speech and expression is absolutely vital in academic institutions. Students who engage in activism should not be punished for doing so, and discipline procedures are not there to be abused as a tool of intimidation. We call for the disciplinary process against Gemma to cease immediately. 9 April 202610 April 2026 · CoPower Against the will to engineer: Richard King’s Brave New Wild Ben Brooker The response demanded of us in the twenty-first century must operate at the level of metaphysics as well as the material, addressing our underlying assumptions about the instrumentalisation of nature and what constitutes a meaningful life in the face of technology’s relentless advance. To neglect that deeper terrain is to concede, in advance, the very ground on which our resistance to the machine must stand.
