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Category: Leaves of Glass

In late 2007 I received a grant from Arts Victoria to write a series of poems based on correspondence between Australian poet Bernard O’Dowd and Walt Whitman. The results were published as Leaves of Glass by Sydney-based publisher Puncher and Wattmann in 2013.

  • Jethro’s Whitman Cabinet

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    3 min read

    ” … a cabinet was specially made. O’Dowd’s wife Evangeline had an uncle, Jethro Fryer, a carpenter who took on this task. SANDRA BURT i hammer nails & saw wood (to make his house of whitman his shadow cabinet not a coffin so much as a grave of words a grove within which they sit…

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  • “I Hate Myself & Want to Die”

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    2 min read

    I believe Fame once intended to give birth to a child. Some accident happened and I was the abortion. B. O’D. I look at what i wrote & feel shame rising like the flood my knees are weak & the lamp light’s glow flatters my corny poetics they’re simplistic & i hate myself no that’s…

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  • Cute

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    2 min read

    “… the cute and loving appreciation of my book and me by them in Australia has gone right to my heart.” —Walt Whitman, writing to Bernard O’Dowd This poem was first published online in Blackbox Manifold (UK) and later in print in Best Australian Poems (Black Inc, 2011). Läs på svenska.

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  • The First Letter

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    2 min read

    I am not going to praise your poetry to you B. O’D. BUT! you make the leaves & the grasses speak for themselves! great scald of demos i am yours! master bending down to meh! like a tree of man your mighty river flows through days your poems like a dripping tap & i a…

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  • Sunbathing

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    2 min read

    This poem first appeared in Overland (2008) and was anthologized in Thirty Australian Poets (UQP, 2011).

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  • Words From the Master

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    2 min read

    Revered master Dear Walt, my beloved master, my friend, my bard my prophet and apostle – Dear Bernard My dear master! Your good, long varied and loving letter came yesterday and has been welcome and nourishing to meh. My dear master! I cannot reply properly, we have been treading air since Dear Bernard O’Dowd (and…

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  • Greetings To Whitman

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    1 min read

    revered master dear walt, my beloved master, my friend, my bard my prophet and apostle my dear master my dear master my dear master my dear master and (may I say?) comrade my dear master my dear master B. O’D.

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  • O’Dowd Seeks Whitman

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    1 min read

    I am 24, red hair, plain features, and a little too backward for my own good. B. O’D. 24yo dawn-red hair western districts oz poet seeks 80ish NS/SD amerikan dusky-grey hair ex-civil war nurse poet for inter-continental correspondences & hero worship – must heart ozpo philo/sci-fi &/or long walks on beach FYI both parents RC…

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  • Gowayz ob LOL: “O Kitteh! Meh Kitteh!”

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    2 min read

    “Similarly, poetry (e.g. the Psalms) can be written in such a way that it looks like a cat wrote it.” —LOLCat Bible Translation Project

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  • Envoi

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    1 min read

    Brennan’s contemporary, Bernard O’Dowd, espoused the cause of nationalism, and attained a far greater reputation in his day; but unlike Brennan’s, his work has dated badly. Judith Wright, A Book of Australian Verse (1968)

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  • O’Dowd Zero

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    2 min read

    This is the first draft of ‘The First Letter’, a poem which later appeared in Leaves of Glass.

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  • Leaves of glass

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    2 min read

    It’s hard to believe this poem was written in 2004, almost a decade before my second full-length poetry collection, also entitled Leaves of Glass, was released. Clearly, this poem has absolutely nothing to do with either Bernard O’Dowd or Walt Whitman. Nevertheless, it did go on to appear in LoG, under the title ‘Leaves of…

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