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'Terra Bravura, began as short text messages sent to David Musgrave from the desert on the way to Broken Hill. He later described their poetic form thuis:'The poems are terrific. Vox clamantis in desierto. The lines are dense and staccato, with a kind of pinpoint-accurate mouthfulness of sound - hard to describe, but it seems to me that the rhythm is what makes it work so distinctively. There are words that leap out at you -'the eagle, canopic on tar, atop kangaroo smear, thrown furred corsets of white bone, confetti of road crows chroming a black storm' - this is inventive, musical and harsh, accurate and rich, with a vein of visionary dream, which I like.' The landscape of feral goats, idiosyncratic human markers, failed fences, becomes the distorted and detail-selective realm of memory. It was written in 2009, when the poet's father began to lose his memory; it is an exploration of oral tradition, the stuff of generational infamy, the coming, by ship in 1855, to Australia . 'That sick green sea/carrying/the little stone/to the orange square...'' (Publication summary)
Notes
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Epigraph: 'The most powerful presence / is absence.' –Dorothy Porter 'Egypt'
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Dedication: For my father.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
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Contemporary Masters
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: Meanjin , Autumn vol. 75 no. 1 2016; (p. 177-182)
— Review of Waiting for the Past 2015 selected work poetry ; Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry ; Indirect Objects 2014 selected work poetry -
Helen Hagemann Reviews Terra Bravura by Meredith Wattison
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: Plumwood Mountain [Online] , February 2016;
— Review of Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry -
Willo Drummond Reviews Terra Bravura by Meredith Wattison
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: Mascara Literary Review , September no. 19 2016;
— Review of Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry -
All The Precious, Broken Things Thrown In
2015
single work
review
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , October no. 51.1 2015;
— Review of Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry -
Activism and Terra Tactics
2015
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 18-19 July 2015; (p. 21)
— Review of The Sixth Creek 2013 selected work poetry ; Love Poems and Death Threats 2014 selected work poetry ; Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry
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This Tethering Muliebrity : Edric Mesmer Reviews ‘terra Bravura’ by Meredith Wattison
2015
single work
review
— Appears in: Rochford Street Review , April - June no. 14 2015;
— Review of Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry -
Activism and Terra Tactics
2015
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 18-19 July 2015; (p. 21)
— Review of The Sixth Creek 2013 selected work poetry ; Love Poems and Death Threats 2014 selected work poetry ; Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry -
All The Precious, Broken Things Thrown In
2015
single work
review
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , October no. 51.1 2015;
— Review of Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry -
Helen Hagemann Reviews Terra Bravura by Meredith Wattison
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: Plumwood Mountain [Online] , February 2016;
— Review of Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry -
Contemporary Masters
2016
single work
review
— Appears in: Meanjin , Autumn vol. 75 no. 1 2016; (p. 177-182)
— Review of Waiting for the Past 2015 selected work poetry ; Terra Bravura 2014 selected work poetry ; Indirect Objects 2014 selected work poetry