Published in Overland Issue 245 Summer 2021 · Poetry Traveller Corey Wakeling after two formerly inconsecutive lines by Nishiwaki Junzaburō 詩のないところに詩がある うつつは淋しい Poetry is where poetry is not Reality is lonesome A comrade made of new-cut pine sitting rooms, because of foxed pages and clamorous awnings, warm dregs improved by salt plum —the breakfast nightingale has only commendations, and hangovers, even if Berlin remains what you’re barricaded from. Fantasy traveller, forget the temperate gauge—dispatch the claws of a hundred skunk cabbage, we do better breathlessly and undistracted at work in reassembly, limiting our confinement to enclosure and saké, even if Osaka remains beyond the territorial coordinate. Typhoon #10 had my name on it, not yours! By the southern mountainside at Yakushima, we calculate three families of grey macaque. Karatani made the transition to historian, so should you, even if the only gallery for it all becomes the Met. Reality is lonesome in poetry, illusory in fine gardening. We take up your challenge of establishing gigantic pine between two detachments. Fish in the storm drain, because you can. When the double-flowered cherry sheds, celebrate—even if spring threatens to return again. Read the rest of Overland 245 If you enjoyed this piece, buy the issue Or subscribe and receive Corey Wakeling Corey Wakeling is a writer, scholar, and translator living in Tokyo. In 2013, he was granted a PhD in English and theatre studies at the University of Melbourne. Corey has lived in Japan since 2015, currently working as an associate professor of English literature at Aoyama Gakuin University. His most recent poetry collection, Uncle of Cats, appears with Cordite in 2024. More by Corey Wakeling › 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.
