Published in Overland Issue 205 Summer 2011 · Uncategorized the supplement Ruby Todd desire creates the hollow in which the bird can roost to what is not I add you a song yet looking for its truth what is absent from the present will demarcate the light to add you as travelling in the desert oceans fill the night horizon of the eye a compass wider than the day for what is not you? behold before a body dies how it longs to stay you are my favourite fact I recall you like a sum add you to what is not between my thoughts the secret pact to this bare hour add one I add you losing this day to dark gods my mind drunk on a dream I feel the equation beckon the bird begins to nod Ruby Todd is undertaking a PhD in Creative Writing at Deakin University. © Ruby Todd Overland 205-summer 2011, p. 79 Like this piece? Subscribe! Ruby Todd More by Ruby Todd › 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.
