HOW TO PEN A SHORT STORY

I've written a handful of ordinary short stories over the years. I'm not sure I know how to write them. Poetry is my poison; I can do (mostly) the fine art of distillation. Anyhow, I'm putting finishing touches to a short story for the $5000 Country Style short story comp due tomorrow... I haven't got it all together. What to leave in? What to leave out? How much dialogue is too much dialogue? Is plot that crucial? How does one end things effectively through the use of novel, subtle, suggestive symbolism/imagery and metaphor? It is what it is... And all it might have been.

LJ, March 28 2011.

VITAL INTEREST

To Libya...

I'm guessing America/NATO's objective is all about oil interests and maintaining Europe's access to resource-rich land. Perhaps I'm too cynical. There's a bit of a saving-the-innocent-populace-under-Gaddafi theme thrown in there, which is a good thing. But how exactly are America/NATO saving them?

Hillary Clinton just announced, 'This is a watershed moment in international decision making' - nice and nebulous - what does she mean? It'll be interesting to see what waffle-dressed-up-as-important-justification spiel Obama brings to us in the next few hours when he addresses the US population about America's role in Libya.

So many hollow things. At least our servicemen and servicewomen aren't caught up in it all. Yet.

LJ, March 28 2011.

LUKE DAVIES AND THE FERAL APHORISMS

Gleebooks, Australia's finest bookstore, provided the venue for Vagabond Press' launch of the new chapbook by Luke Davies, The Feral Aphorisms, last Sunday. I've always been impressed by the scope, intelligence, emotional weight and pyrotechnics of Davies' work. His poem Totem is one of the most impressive sustained, lyrical works any Australian writer has offered us.

Luke was a support when I first began seriously sculpting verse a decade ago. He once told me I was a writer going somewhere. His words have helped lift me when I thought I was a writer going nowhere.

I look forward to his next full-length poetry collection released in September.

LJ, March 15 2011.