Poetry

Beautiful Veins by Mal Morgan & Fighting in the Shade by Peter Kocan

Item: Beautiful Veins
Author: Martin Harrison

by Martin Harrison •

April 2000, no. 219

Beautiful Veins by Mal Morgan

Five Islands Press, $18.95 pb, 64 pp

Fighting in the Shade by Peter Kocan

Hale and Iremonger, $18.95 pb, 72 pp

Poetry

Beautiful Veins by Mal Morgan & Fighting in the Shade by Peter Kocan

by Martin Harrison •

April 2000, no. 219

In a note to the reader, Mal Morgan tells us that this last, posthumous collection Beautiful Veins – it comes with a CD selected from this and other work – was written during the five months after his being diagnosed with lung cancer. They’re note-taking, note-jotting poems. A sense of someone hurriedly trying to account for and describe his response both to the diagnosis and to the radiotherapy and chemotherapy treatments which ensue is uppermost. Strong, disturbing, they’re often ‘I do this, I do that’ (Frank O’Hara’s phrase) confessional poems.

Martin Harrison

Martin Harrison (1949–2014) was a celebrated poet and critic. Born in Yorkshire, he settled in Sydney in 1978 after living for a few years in New Zealand. He worked as a journalist for the ABC, where he was responsible for adventurous and innovative arts programming (particularly with regard to poetry and sound art), and taught at UTS, where he was a Senior Lecturer. He authored nine collections of poetry, including the critically acclaimed Wild Bees (2008) and the posthumously published Happiness (2014). A collection of his critical writings is currently being edited.