Poem of the Month – June 2026 – Avalanche

The Poem of the Month for June 2026, selected by 2026 Anthology editors Elizabeth Salna and Erica Jolly, is Where are they now? by Avalanche. The commended poems are I take nothing away by Geoffrey Aitken, After the Revolution by Steve Evans, My Father’s Zen (For my father) by Leon Ferrante, The Poetry Club by Nigel Ford and His Moment by phil saunders.

Where are they now?
Avalanche

I often wonder,
where are they now?

I hear Cinderella’s running dance classes
and Rapunzel’s got a hair salon,
Snow White’s got an apple orchard
specializing in dwarf varieties –
but the Little Mermaid’s had no luck
at all with her singing classes,
Little Red Riding Hood’s running
a bed-and -breakfast for seniors nowadays,
linked in with Peter Pan’s adventures holidays
for the young-at-heart …

apparently Hansel and Gretel are in the gingerbread
architecture business, doing well,
Prometheus does a great trade
with his tanning studio,
Mary Poppins runs a travel agency
with a side line in umbrellas …
and Dr Faust?… Click for more

FSP submission to National Cultural Policy

In 2026, Australians were invited to share their views and help guide the next National Cultural Policy. Prompted especially by concerns about resurgent attacks on freedom of creative and intellectual expression, the Friendly Street committee felt it was imperative to ensure the recognition of poetry’s significance in Australia’s cultural policy. Our submission was the result and was endorsed by various other poets and Friendly Street alumni, including Dr Susan O’Brien and Mike Ladd, who also made individual submissions of their own.

The submission by Friendly Street Poets can be read here in both its original form (hosted on the National Cultural Policy’s submissions page) and with a minor amendment emphasising the late Stephen Lawrence’s remarks about poetry’s ‘lowly’ yet advantageous role within the wider literary sphere.… Click for more

FSP July City meeting and Open Mic

Friday 3rd July 2026
doors at 6:00pm for 6:30pm start

The Box Factory
59 Regent St, Adelaide, SA 5000

$5 to read, free to listen.

Share some poetry, listen to others reading and enjoy the friendly poetry vibes of the biggest and oldest ongoing poetry group in the Southern Hemisphere.

As usual, a strict 3-minute time limit applies, including any introductions, explanations and post-scripts. Bring two typed / printed copies of your poem with all your contact details on the back of the pages for submission to the next FSP Annual Anthology. You also can submit your poem electronically via the form below.… Click for more

Poem of the Month – May 2026 – Murray Alfredson

The Poem of the Month for May 2026, selected by 2026 Anthology editors Elizabeth Salna and Erica Jolly, is Fig by Murray Alfredson. The commended poems are Double Helix by Val Braendler, 18 Ways to Look at a Date by Judy Dally, blur by Rory Harris, and The Space Between by Colleen Lamshed.

Fig
Murray Alfredson

Now take the fig. Who ever knows its sweetness
flowered a thousand fold it seems, and fruited
within a stubby open stem, whoever
knows its tiny sting from milky sap
on lips and tongue, might also know that tree
has little need of core or heartwood, its stems
and branches hollow, laddered, filled with pith,
its fruit with nothing but an airy centre.… Click for more

FSP June City Meeting and Open Mic

Friday 5th June 2026
doors at 6:00pm for 6:30pm start

The Box Factory
59 Regent St, Adelaide, SA 5000

$5 to read, free to listen.

Share some poetry, listen to others reading and enjoy the friendly poetry vibes of the biggest and oldest ongoing poetry group in the Southern Hemisphere.

As usual, a strict 3-minute time limit applies, including any introductions, explanations and post-scripts. Bring two typed / printed copies of your poem with all your contact details on the back of the pages for submission to the next FSP Annual Anthology. You also can submit your poem electronically via the form below.… Click for more

Poems of the Month – April 2026 – Ben Adams & Veronica Cookson

The Poems of the Month for April 2026, selected by 2026 Anthology editors Elizabeth Salna and Erica Jolly, are flattop by Ben Adams and Modern Slant on an Old Story by Veronica Cookson. The commended poems are Swallowtail Butterfly by Kylie Dinning, Broken News by Billy-Jack Johnson, Evelyn, Little Evelyn by Geoff Johnson and Travelling North by Rob McKinnon.

flattop
Ben Adams

the instinct of fire is
conflagration

filling space like a man who won’t stop talking
about not getting caught in groupthink
how he doesn’t see empathy as a virtue
and that he formulated these ideas
after reading Orwell, Huxley, Peterson
and Plato
speaking to people
and dating a woman
whose worldview was based on emotions

he hates cops
for all the wrong reasons

considers multiculturalism impossible
from a logical standpoint
and says educated white people think BBQs and backyard cricket
are analogous with white supremacy
slight hyperbole, he admits
but not far from the mark

he is an exothermic process
becoming everything
replacing air with heat, the still surface
of a flattop grill or timber frame
a hanging tent flap, or skin
with crackling singe and melt

he’s forgotten to flip the snags again

the way embers smoulder
kindling catches love like a spark
follows algorithmic oxygen
to inhale it like hate, like something
his body wants
the world is a many-faced god

and he’s forgotten to check the steaks
as we stand away in the smokers’ corner
discussing the sociology of flame

as weapon of war, the worst way to die
he talks about diesel engines
speeding fines and the family court
religion as culture
and ritual, a warm hearth
he remembers

I mention the witches they burned

tell him that
combustion doesn’t care
what it consumes

and violence only becomes visible
at the ignition point

Modern Slant on an Old Story
Veronica Cookson

The original
Antonio, Merchant of Venice, Act 1, Scene 1

‘In sooth, I know not why I am so sad.… Click for more

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