Published in Overland Issue 205 Summer 2011 Uncategorized Bite the Wax Tadpole DJ Huppatz History is the heavy. The Azure Dragon lives in a world woven by ration and romantics. It’s easiest to capture things that don’t move. Large bronze vats, for example. Weeds twist the blue-tiled roof out of proportion, lead petals drop chips on the golden paper sails. My little rose-cherry-rusty lotus bud looked counter-evolutionary in her velvet uniform and silver boots. Xinjiang restaurateurs, Henan recyclers, Anhui maids and Hebei builders, shepherded by an invisible hand, like a swarm of swallows or the melancholic object of her disappearing. In those days there was no electricity, the attendants carried lanterns of scarlet gaze. Now the city’s a radio and the Azure Dragon is broadcasting: “Bite the Wax Tadpole, The World’s Most Stimulating Bland.” DJ Huppatz D J Huppatz is a Melbourne-based writer who has had poetry published recently in VLAK 2 (2011) and Black Inc.’s The Best Australian Poems 2011. More by DJ Huppatz 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 First published in Overland Issue 228 25 November 202225 November 2022 Poetry Poetry | Summer animal Jini Maxwell This summer I can feel myself turning back into an animal. I wake up early and seek out trees, walking through the expansive quiet of the park until the heat starts feeling sharp on my skin. I leave the blinds closed, so when I return home the building is dark and familiar, and as I shut the door behind me I feel a satisfaction I can only describe as territorial. First published in Overland Issue 228 24 November 202225 November 2022 Politics ‘Sir, please get me the Manager’: Brazil before and after Bolsonaro Guido Melo By then, although young in age, I already knew about those rituals of humiliation and how they were part of my Black family's lives. I also knew that surviving those daily interactions required putting my head down and following the instructions received with no hesitation. I must have had ‘the talk ‘with my parents when I was eight or nine. Life was just like that. Being Black in Brazil means living in a war. No one should ever go to war underprepared.
