Pub day

Well today’s the day! The day I’ll look back on in years to come.
The day I finally became a published poet.

Published in print! Published by someone other than myself!

Well actually, it happened about a year ago, here:
DIRTY MOUTH queer poetry zine // issue 2 // july 22

I emailed through a poem, and Sunny Olive agreed to publish it!
But then, nothing. Occasionally I would grumble about false hope. Curse Sunny for living in Naarm (Melbourne), and zines for being hardcopy and niche.

But I recently got word that Sunny (xo) Olive had organised a live queer poetry night, in conjunction with Sappho Queers and Bernie’s Bar (Newcastle’s newest queer space).

Even though Sunny’s car sadly stranded them down south, they’re fabulously charismatic. Their Zoom presence is larger than most of us are in real life.

I felt immediately welcome, held and safe in the space Sunny helped create. And upon their introduction, I leapt on the mic without fear. I mean…kinda?

I read out three poems that night, one of which is now also published in issue 3 // june 23.

As Sunny tells it, they created DIRTY MOUTH to help drag themself through COVID — and it’s one of the very many silver linings of that dirty dirty cloud. All three issues of the zine are now available online, in their full-colour, queer, illustrated glory.

Thanks Sunny, hunny bunny!
Cos you rock, people flock.
XO