Dead tree emerging from white sand with red sand hills in the background against a blue sky

Astro Turf

by Gaele Sobott

deserts stalk the earth

at ever-increasing kilometers per year

                    annihilate soil that nurtures new growth

              fill the girlchild’s eyes with grit

         at ever-increasing kilometers per year

                 the Gobi the Sahara the Kalahari

                               fill the girlchild’s eyes with grit

                 propelled forward like dehydrated race walkers

              the Gobi the Sahara the Kalahari

                         whip up disease-laden dust storms

                                     propelled forward like dehydrated race walkers

                         valley fever whooping cough meningitis Kawasaki disease …

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A still from the animation I was born (Misfit).Four people facing a circle of solid black in a square. They have different coloured heads (green, yellow, red and blue). The smallest person is reaching up to touch the circle. Drawn by Daria Lytvynenko.

Earthly: poems by Gaele Sobott

I allow unarticulated feelings, thoughts and knowing to direct the course of my poems. Floating, allowing the parts of my brain that daydream, intuit, engage in parallel-interactive logic to take over. Maybe, in the end, poetry is a process of interpreting the knowing that exists within bodily experiences, around the body and between one body and other bodies. Surprises and dilemmas emerge along the way and when I work out which direction to take, I spend time crafting a poem.

Some describe elements of my writing as magical. I see these elements as reflections of cultural realities; myth, turns of phrase, musicality of spoken language, the way imagination can be part of the everyday and accepted by a community as such.

I believe my writing is informed by a combination of the joy of imagining, anger, grief, love and disdain. Growing up working class, losing memory, I demand the right to get grammar and other bits and pieces technically wrong, but seek to be subjectively and poetically authentic.

Full article and poems published in Disability Arts Online Showcase

Disability Arts Online is an organisation led by disabled people, set up to advance disability arts and culture through the pages of our journal. Their raison d’être is to support disabled artists, as much as anything by getting the word out about the fantastic art being produced by artists within the sector.

Disability Arts Online give disabled artists a platform to blog and share thoughts and images describing artistic practice, projects and just the daily stuff of finding inspiration to be creative.