Published in Overland Issue 202 Autumn 2011 · Main Posts / Writing Ash-brie’s Old Blue Stuart Cooke for the Hillbillies stripping by the river’s old- gum language we lick the ash of brie from abysses between teeth invite licks a return to favourites to ri sing up with the smoke of strings strummed in the soil keys the churning current the mutual slap of skins whitening wildening of the walkers heightening the chomp of throat biscuits in the wooden smoke:_______ Kate’s interluding the lush messing speaks bush the being is ea(r)t(h) rotten paddies flat – ter sign – ing the sigh tolls for whom your wettening whorls when we stop we grow silent we are the photos taken by the old blue guitar Stuart Cooke Stuart Cooke’s latest chapbook, Departure into Cloud, was published by Vagabond Press in 2013. His full-length collection is Edge Music (IP, 2011). He is a lecturer in creative writing and literary studies at Griffith University on the Gold Coast. More by Stuart Cooke 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 3 First published in Overland Issue 228 26 May 20238 June 2023 · Writing garramilla/Darwin Lulu Houdini We sit in East Point Reserve and look at how the gidjaas, green ants, make globe-like homes out of the leaves — connected edges with fibrous tissue that I later learn is faithful silk. Safe inside. Why isn’t it safe outside? I pick up the plastic around this circular lake cause this is the way […] First published in Overland Issue 228 25 May 202326 May 2023 · Main Posts The ‘Chinese question’ and colonial capitalism in New Gold Mountain Christy Tan SBS’s New Gold Mountain sets out to recover the history of the Gold Rush from the marginalised perspective of Chinese settlers but instead reinforces the erasure of Indigenous sovereignty. Although celebrated for its multilingual script and diverse representation, the mini-TV series ignores how the settlement of Chinese migrants and their recruitment into colonial capitalism consolidates the ongoing displacement of First Nations peoples.
