Disarmed edited by Jean Sietzema-Dickson and Kathryn Hamann
This is the seventh anthology of work from the Wordsmiths. It contains the winning poems from the 2004 Poetica Christi Press Poetry competition. PCP’s two previous competition anthologies have been commended by the Fellowship of Australian Writers in its community writing awards for 2004.
“The poems in this book insist, in so many different ways, that we must never give up the possibility of peace. They are in truth part of the work of bringing peace.” From the Foreword.
FIRST LIGHT*
one
A sliver of cloud
receives the first light
Those rocks are washed
and washed again
Orange and blue
wed on the horizon
the Norfolk Pine
points to God,
like a sacrament.
two
We make our pews
these sea-smoothed rocks;
all of us, monastic, seaward,
are copying words
from the book of God.
three
It rises like the face of God
shines on our upturned faces;
this face we cannot look at,
yet cannot look away.
four
Ones and twos,
twos and threes,
are trailing home,
like pilgrims.
Tim Vanderstoep
* This poem won the 2004 Poetica Christi Press Poetry Competition.