I mentioned recently that SpeedPoets was featuring two Melburnians this month… and I am pleased to announce that joining Peter Bakowski will be Koraly Dimitriades. Koraly is in Brisbane as part of a national tour, to launch the Deluxe Edition of her debut collection, Love & Fuck Poems.
Here’s a hit of Koraly’s work to get you primed for the gig:
SpeedPoets, Sunday October 7, 2:30pm – 5:00pm, Brew (Lower Burnett Lane, The City)
Wog Woman Writer (what it’s like)
On one side, the wogs:
I go to Mum’s house, proceed to proclaiming
my recent publication in a literary journal
to which she asks if I’ve vacuumed my house.
If I ask her if she’s heard me, she will respond with
details of how my divorce which took place
two years ago, ruined her life.
I leave the room but I love her.
She came on the boat
nowhere to go but marriage,
sometimes she didn’t even have food
in the village where she grew up.
On the other side, the publishing giants:
Submitting your manuscript to a publisher
Being praised for the story, well developed characters
Strong story arc, but that the manuscript lacks ‘literary merit.’
Scanning the list of contributor names to journals or
funding recipients for Arts Victoria and struggling
to find a surname that looks wog,
waiting for an incision in the Aussie literary voice
the bright light that might tear in the fabric
Blogging for a left-wing journal
finally feeling like you’re being recognised
that you’re writing is worth something
only to be sacked and amounting to nothing
but slave-labour words on a computer screen
replaced with big-shot Aussie Phd names
that you sound nothing like, and never will
(or sometimes you consider changing your voice)
explaining to Dad what happened
Dad, sitting me down comfortingly,
shaking his head and responding ‘Ithes?’ See?
‘Now I hope you think very hard
about returning to your job as a programmer.’
I lower my head
sending my ‘Wog’ YouTube video out to family,
telling them the situation, getting no response
except for one sister saying ‘I don’t do wog poems’
and asking me to take her off my email list,
loving her so much I feel her humiliation
Going to her house later in the week
where she plays me YouTube videos of
So Tiri, a Greek-American musician
rapping about feta and bread and Avgolemoni soup
who has millions of hits on his YouTube,
the sinking reality that most of my wog generation
prefer this, Wog Boy and My Big Fat Greek Wedding films
than stories revealing the shit layered under the cultural carpet
Most wogs haven’t even read Christos Tsiolkas
If they have it’s only because he made it
and therefore there must be merit, in what he has to say
Speaking my mind like a wog, my voice too raw
too confronting, too fused with emotion
I consider a Phd nightmare to flatten out my voice
but I’m stuck in single mum slum,
the odds against me because I have a cunt
and I have no trust, in the literary system, anymore
Sometimes I consider presenting myself
to the nearest publishing house,
palms pressed together as if in prayer
and asking if they please wouldn’t mind
stitching my hands shut so I can neither write nor type
(I will provide them with the needle and thread)
While the editor and publisher boil tea in preparation
I will continue to pray, for a miracle
When they return with their English china
and sympathetic faces, threading the needle
I will begin to tremble and cry
and they will comfort me
There, there, Koraly, we understand
We understand it’s been hard, it’s okay
The first stich will hurt the most, but to distract myself
I will confess to them every single rejection
as they stitch each pair of fingers together,
the hardships of having to subscribe to journals
to be considered for publication, running out of money
having less success with publication, the more confronting I get
There, there, Koraly, we understand
We’re almost done, just the pinky fingers left…
After I’m done confessing, I will recite poetry
until they’re finished and they can marvel
at my exotic verse as the blood drips from my hands
and onto the pages of their next publication
A book by Mr John Smith
**********
Koraly Dimitriadis is a Melbourne based Cypriot-Australian writer of poetry, short stories and novels. Her work has been published widely. She is a spoken word radio presenter and an Australian poetry café poet. The success of her zine, Love and Fuck Poems, available nationally and internationally, led her to publish Love and Fuck Poems: The Deluxe edition which she will be unveiling on the day as part of her national tour.
