A new poem by writer and performer Freya Daly Sadgrove. TURDUCKEN I blow my body around like the huge clump of brown hair that I once saw blowing up Cuba Street I follow its movements with interest I put a video of it on the internet my favourite … Read more
A new poem by Wellington poet Jenny Bornholdt. Duck Three Ways Let’s put our mother’s favourite cat socks on and move to Canada. * Let’s eat duck three ways. The first the way my flatmate hit one in his car. After bundling the body into the boot, he drove home, traumatised, to tell … Read more
A new poem by Hera Lindsay Bird. COLORADO SPRINGS 1989 After David Berman whenever I get lonely I go to department stores and wander around looking at all the t-shirts with made-up names and dates on them. some days I think it’s almost sweet this collective longing for an imaginary past if they weren’t so … Read more
A prose poem by Wellington writer Susanna Gendall. Art The number of artists at the art gallery was overwhelming. It seemed there were too many. There were too many. Never would so many poems be assembled in a single building and people expected to walk around and read each one. It seemed an unfair burden … Read more
A new poem by Oamaru-born poet Nick Ascroft. Superman Halfway up the ascent zigzagging from Royal Terrace to upper Stuart Street carrying four too-heavy grocery bags I begin to understand that I will not make it. My huffing personage – from the fingers, white with the strain, to a face the … Read more
A poem by Primo Levi (1919–1987), translated by New Zealanders Marco Sonzogni and Harry Thomas. Samson Son of a sterile mother, I also was announced By a messenger, a man Of terrible countenance. I was a child of the Sun, And was myself the Sun. I had the Sun’s force … Read more
A poem by Miramar poet Geoff Cochrane. Channel Hopping Stupa or Stuka? Weet-Bix or Welsh rabbit? Galactic aerodrome or Matchbox truck? * I’m young in my dreams, still young. * Beautiful Keanu’s wearing shades— antique shades with iodine-coloured lenses. * I’m young in my dreams, still young, and I still have some ink … Read more
A poem by Wellington writer Laura Vincent. ACTIVITIES You know when you’re not strong enough to articulate your feelings because all of your strength is being used for one thing and that one thing is ACTIVITIES endless ACTIVITIES when that person invites you to paper-mâché a to-scale volcano or to ride a bicycle … Read more
A new prose poem by Palmerston North poet Tim Upperton. The riderless horses One evening that summer a riderless horse galloped along our road, empty stirrups slapping. We ran up the driveway screaming to our mother. Quick, inside! she said. She shut and locked the door, closed the windows. The horse tried the door handle, … Read more
New poetry by Lisbon-based writer Hana Pera Aoake. The bigger the burn the tougher you are I sit under the plum tree and eat Christmas plums. The afternoon sun hits my face and I think about Halle Berry in Die Another Day kicking a knife through a copy of The Art of War and … Read more
A new poem by acclaimed poet and performer Tusiata Avia. Massacre Thursday 14 March When I arrive in Auckland and Hine learns that I have moved back to Christchurch she asks me if I know it is a bad place it is built on a swamp many bad things have been done … Read more
New poetry by Auckland writer Fardowsa Mohamed. Alien When I was born, Earth held me in her mouth then promptly spat me out. I saw my first map of the world six years later. I remember the cartographer’s straight lines through Africa and I wondered if he could be trusted. My grandmother’s name … Read more
New poetry by Wellington poet and artist Ana Iti. All the way to Te Rerenga Wairua Does the spirit intrinsically know what direction to travel to get to Hawaiki? Or Heaven? Is there some colonial idea of blood quantum that first has to be observed? Would the saliva of the intangible get processed by … Read more
New verse from poet and playwright Renee Liang. Contents of a mummy Tardis handbag 1 pair sparkly sneakers 1 small bag defrosted peas, rejected by non-health-conscious ducks in the domain re 1 tube sunblock (unused) 2 battery packs for iPad iPad, open at Lego Star Wars game iPhone, open at Pokémon Go wallet packed with … Read more
New poetry from Wellington-born writer Ursula Robinson-Shaw. Everything is nice they have announced the last day mel waters the garden the dirt is hard for summer everybody is hard for summer to drink lavish cocktails to meet-cute on the table of the harsh dissolving seasons to take girls back to our houses in … Read more
A new poem sequence by Wellington poet Jackson Nieuwland. They told me to be myself, so I entered the hive. Bees the size of my head descended upon me. They covered every inch of my body like a chrysalis. I continued walking forward, through a blur of buzz and fuzz. At the center of … Read more
New poetry by Piha poet Nikki-Lee Birdsey Objects 6 This time of year I try to think about what is better than beauty. Rose-pink clouds crowd the sky, crowd my page— I think of your face. I can’t fantasise like I did when I was a child, whole worlds snapping into place in an instant … Read more
New poetry by author Erik Kennedy. Out on the Pleasure Pier Out on the pleasure pier on that benign afternoon, the air heavy with the blossom of vinegar and old tyres, you asked what was the closest I had come to death. I thought of when I had applied the bolt-cutters to that … Read more
New poetry by Wellington writer Carolyn DeCarlo. The Ultimate Freedom of Space and Time Sometimes when masturbating I think about my friends’ perfect bodies having sex with angels. Or, angelic sex with each other. Or, dirty sex where my friends are covered in mud and having sex with earthworms. Having sex in pools of blood … Read more
New verse from Syrian-New Zealand poet and high schooler Mohamed Al Mansour. In Lebanon I had a big football team, twenty-three players and two captains. My two best friends in the team were Ali Ahmad and Mohamed. Ali Ahmad is fast and Mohamed is tall. We played in the same place every time. The ground … Read more
New work by poet Mohamed Hassan. If you are on mobile, read the poem in its intended format here. National Anthem I pledge allegiance to love and good coffee a sleepy heart two sets of feet burning a clatter … Read more
New work by Fern Flat poet Sugar Magnolia Wilson. Spent The night sky is full of stars but we are more clever than most – we know they are just burned bones. Nothing beautiful – not space sailors blown from their ships – the light from treasure quickly grasped in … Read more
New poetry by Semira Davis. Into the garden come into the garden where your mother and uncle lean the bamboo corpses into triangle arches for the beans the garden where the earth reads your palm and the life line the love line the heart line are dirty and mud come into the garden and … Read more
Following last week’s revelations about James K Baxter, poetry editor Ashleigh Young presents a poem by Baxter’s wife, the late Jacquie Sturm. In Loco Parentis for Ethel and Bert Eleven years old in domestic service Blacking other children’s boots and only One day off a month to visit mother. That was her. He counted himself lucky With … Read more
New poetry (untitled) by Wellington writer Gregory Kan. I thought that the things I loved were places I could always go back to but the spaces between things become places themselves and threaten to swallow me whole. I thought that knowing in just the right way would be enough to … Read more
New poetry by Oscar Upperton. Cross dresser I am a pious woman. I watch as the men leave for war. I rake the garden over with my hands. War visits on the roof of the church. She sits like a great owl, hooting. I turn my face away. I pray, Lord I pray. … Read more
New poetry by Thames writer Bob Orr. Hawaiki My first university the freezing works at Horotiu – my first professor a tohunga in white overalls and gumboots who worked on the boning floor. One evening drinking beer as the setting sun was turning the Waikato River red … Read more
New poetry by Auckland writer Steven Toussaint. Yes or No Are you happy with your service provider? Have you contemplated private piety’s competitive prices? Are you in the market for something like but not precisely eternal return? Have you been waiting long in our baffled room? … Read more
New verse by Pt Chevalier writer Jenny Blood. My mother My mother kept eleven glasses of water Beside her bed She would only eat bananas and tinned mandarins Her room stank She said they were trying To kill her I don’t blame them Jenny Blood, 2018 The Spinoff Review of Books is … Read more