Published in Overland Issue 234 Autumn 2019 · Uncategorized Judith Wright Poetry Prize, third place: Surfing at Blackfellas Ross Belton Blackfellas is over the edge a sheer drop beside a path perched against the limestone cliff down to a narrow ledge and plunge a fast paddle over dark water out to the swell rising up from the deep breaking swollen tongues against the silent jaws of the continent. Blackfellas is barely a carpark of loose rock and windblown gulls facing Antarctica another outpost on the massacre atlas bleached of all other witness only a squinting glare to honour the last cries of the frightened and defiant mustered from the camps and the stunted heath forced at gunpoint to fly from this world into the maw of the deafening south wind Image: Ian / Flickr Read the rest of Overland 234 If you enjoyed the results of this prize, buy the issue Or subscribe and receive four brilliant issues for a year Ross Belton Ross Belton grew up in Esperance on the Western Australian south coast, graduated in environmental science and has worked in disability facilitation, zookeeping, and in the public service. He lives with his son Jacky Blue, and Jo the Cripster, in Fremantle, where he writes recipes for climate change lamingtons. More by Ross Belton › 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 18 March 2024 · France Emmanuel Macron and the rearming of French demography Stephen Pascoe Demography, that supposedly neutral science of human statistics, is only ever one step away from politics. Especially so in France, where the national discourse over the past two months has summoned historical memory and hinted at political futures in disturbing admixture. First published in Overland Issue 228 8 March 20248 March 2024 · Poetry POETRY Gareth Morgan as if a poem were a person, me, i get up in the morning / i buy coffee in a can, and wait / you have to keep calm, “don't get upset” / or it fucks everything up. the bosses who tell me this / are wise but stupid troopers. this is a political poem