Published in Overland Issue 223 Winter 2016 · Uncategorized Night pieces Leif Mahoney The swung torch scatters seeds The intemperate torch grazed In the umbelliferous dark With fire the umbel of the dark And a frog makes guttural comment The pond-lilies could not stifle On the naked and trespassing The green descant of frogs Nymph of the lake The symbols were evident We had not heeded the warning Though on park-gates That the iron birds creaked The iron birds looked disapproval As we swung the park-gates With rusty invidious beaks Their beaks glinted with dew Among the water lilies A splash – the silver nymph A splash – white foam in the dark Was a foam flake in the night And you lay sobbing then But though the careful winds Upon my trembling intuitive arm Visited our trembling flesh They carried no echo an Ern Malley compilation Read the rest of Overland 223 – If you liked this article, please subscribe or donate. Leif Mahoney Leif Mahoney is a former architect and art gallery director, who is an art language artist. His major project has been the abstract dada novel Nunawading. More by Leif Mahoney › 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 6 December 20236 December 2023 · The environment A sitting duck? Environmentalism and working-class recreation Scott Robinson Masculinity, like hunting, cannot on its own explain the persistent tensions between environmentalism and labour. Work itself dominates the formation of our relationship with nature, so that even in play and leisure we are shaped by the physical and mental techniques applied to us in employment. First published in Overland Issue 228 4 December 20234 December 2023 · Climate politics Where is the Australian climate movement’s solidarity with Palestine? Alex Kelly Let this be a line in the sand. Let us learn our history. Let us listen to liberation movements around the world. Conflicts for land and water will shape the decades to come. Showing up for each other and building power to demand justice is our only hope for a humane future.