Published in Overland Issue 258 2025 · Uncategorized Emote Sarah Penwarden in the universe our planet is a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam (Carl Sagan) The sun is strange today, sky glows dull and light — dust particles — and I am full of others, carrying crowds. The memories of their talk leak from my skin, reminders of their flow, the bagpipe of their lungs empties, fills. We are here — our teeth jar with a similar ache; we are here on this pale blue dot containing all those who have ever lived. Circling round the sun, I ask that there may yet be a turn, a coming home to the common rising-falling of our breath. Sarah Penwarden Sarah Penwarden is a therapist based in Auckland. She has had poems published in Poetry New Zealand, Turbine, Meniscus, Southerly, Mayhem, and takahē. She has had stories published in tākāhe and Meniscus, and a story broadcast on Radio New Zealand. More by Sarah Penwarden › 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 1 6 November 2026 · Friday Fiction Headland Harry Goddard He must have still been sore. I could tell from the winces he made as he scooted down the trail. Some unspoken agreement of not hitting other people’s children — and the circumstances of me not being that type of kid — spared me from the same punishment. I was taken to my parents who agreed I would have to work off the damages, and I must have mowed the lawn once, or cleaned the family car. 4 November 2026 · Film MIFF, Minotaur and the politics of maternal reception Alicia Byrnes Maternal labour is, in the terms I’ve set out here, not labour at all. Noisy, unfocused, mobile, perhaps even sleepy — it is an affront to arthouse film viewing and therefore unserious.
