Do You Like Spiders?

February 15, 2025February 15, 2025 ~ Libby Sommer ~ 9 Comments

Have a read of my poem ‘Weavers’, first published in Quadrant Magazine. Let me know what you think. ‘Weavers’ is one of the pieces in my second poetry collection ‘Flat White, One Sugar’ (Ginninderra Press).

Weavers:

A well-hidden spider

created patterns

outside my office window

against the wooden frame.

I’d see the new progression

of her magnum opus

from my writing desk.

I’d be weaving plot entanglements

and she’d have shown off

her vision

to fast-moving days

as the year raced to its ending.

In the afternoons I’d be outside

hanging washing

picking up broken branches

watering herbs

and she’d have converted

moths and small flies into

sticky brown blobs.

A kookaburra laughed

from the clothesline.

Daily spider prompts helped drive me,

our compulsions to create on either

side of the glass.

One day the cleaner

sprayed the windows,

splattered and splashed,

with his power-hose.

By noon all surfaces

shone brightly.

Did the spider live?

Did she find a different hideout?

Her masterpiece is imprinted

on my brain:

its scaffolding

beginnings,

endings.

Poetry Review

October 10, 2024October 10, 2024 ~ Libby Sommer ~ 4 Comments

There is a fabulous extensive review by Sean Wayman in this month’s October Quadrant Magazine of my two recent poetry collections, ‘The Cellist a Bellydancer & Other Distractions’ and ‘Flat White, One Sugar ‘.

For example he writes: “… there are still many poets who resist the temptations of narcissistic self-righteousness. Libby Sommer, a prolific Australian writer of fiction and poetry, eschews the moral posturing of the ideologically pure poet to cultivate an aesthetic that is observant, curious and open to experience.”

“… it is the give-and-take between openness and particularity which give her poems their unique charisma.”

“… “‘Transience’, like many of her most beautiful passages, combines sunlight, water, and open expanses of sky:

A luminous, tangerine, and blazing expanse
burst out to the left of the blue
from the harbour to the city as the western light
lowered itself behind concrete high-rises.”

If you’d like to read the full review, Quadrant Magazine is available in newsagents and online. My books can be ordered from Ginninderra Press or from other online booksellers.

https://www.ginninderrapress.com.au/store.php?catalog/search/Libby+Sommer/date/1

Photos by Jason Painter

My Poem, “A Refuge”

September 4, 2024 ~ Libby Sommer ~ 1 Comment

Have a read of my poem, “A Refuge” written during the pandemic and first published in Quadrant Magazine. “A Refuge” is one of the poems in my recently released second collection titled “Flat White, One Sugar” (Ginninderra Press).

A Refuge:

Do you know, St Honoré Bakery,

your large black & white floor tiles

show the exact space for Social Distancing?

Your blackboard menu out front

flags passage to the shopping centre.

Surely sophisticated French indulgences

upstage all else inside,

your gateaux worthy of any Parisian patisserie:

flaky puff pastry, velvety cream,

bite-sized choux balls.

But where are you on Sunday mornings, St Honoré,

when the early cyclists ride past?

Your door is closed, your ovens unlit.

Here come gumboots & wet umbrellas

as we all live through wild weather

– back-to-back La Niñas –

and teachers from across the road arrive

in shoes with stiletto heels.

Don’t we all need a dry haven

from unrelenting winter storms?

East of the city, weather-eroded beaches

promise summer sunshine

for our light-deprived eyes.

As the ocean comes up to the land,

we hope these beaches don’t disappear.

There’s blue sky to wish for

in a gap in the clouds.

St Honoré, patron saint of bakers

& pastry cooks, I think I’m addicted to you.

I’m wondering, will your baking give

hope & warmth today?

My Poem ‘Twisted Tea’

May 21, 2024 ~ Libby Sommer ~ 7 Comments

Have a read of my poem ‘Twisted Tea’ first published in ‘For Ukraine: By Women of the World‘, a collection of powerful poetry and prose by all who identify as women about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine led by Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin.

I wrote the poem in 2022. ‘Twisted Tea’ is also one of the poems in my second poetry collection titled ‘Flat White, One Sugar‘, Ginninderra Press.

I hope you enjoy it.

Twisted Tea:

I splattered the last of my favourite

loose leaf tea all over the floor today,

when I lost my grip on the lid.

Twisted Oolong produced in Ukraine

it said on the label.

But it is a time of such sadness,

a spilt canister of loose leaf

is hardly worth mentioning.

So many shattered tea sets