This is a podcast episode of the 3CR Spoken Word show with host Indrani Perera, recorded on 21 July 2024.

In this episode Alison J Barton, talks about her forthcoming debut poetry collection, Not Telling, colonisation, German missionaries and psychoanalytic theory. This recording has a trigger warning for colonisation, death and grief.

Alison J Barton is a Wiradjuri poet whose work appears in Australian and international journals and anthologies such as Meanjin, Cordite, Westerly, Mascara Literary Review, Australian Poetry Journal, Blackbox Manifold and many more. In 2023, she was the inaugural winner of the University of Cambridge First Nations Writer-in-Residence Fellowships. She has been the recipient of several fellowships with Varuna House and the winner of a number of international writing residencies. Alison’s poetry appeared in the Best of Australian Poems 2022 and 2023, and has been recognised in numerous prizes. She appeared in podcasts for The Guilty Feminist and Poetry Says. Her first full-length collection of poetry, Not Telling, will be out with Puncher & Wattmann next month. 

Poems written and performed by Alison J Barton in this episode:

Buried Light

Birth Dress

Dreams for the Mill

Seasons

Tincture

Feather Dress

Thank you to Alison J Barton for sharing her poetry and to you for listening!