Renate Millonig 
Due to popular demand, the Aldinga Village Voice Poetry Prize is back, and will see a $25 gift voucher from one of our fine local establishments awarded to a local poet.
Submissions of 300 words or less are preferred, and should be sent as a Word Document or Text File to info@aldingavillagevoice.com.au
The Judges’ decision is final.
Winners will be announced by return email, and announced in the pages of the Aldinga Village Voice.
Our first entrant in this new phase of the Poetry Prize is Renate Millonig of Aldinga, who was inspired to verse by the ongoing tragedy of the Algal Bloom Outbreak on our local beaches.
Thank Renata!
‘Algal Bloom’
slow
slow
sinking
down
ocean depth deathbed
fall
fall
all
fall
down
slack
collapsed
deflated
eyes wide with death
shrunken, sunken, silenced
so many sea creatures perishing
I am gutted
snared
hooked by your demise
crab-like I cringe
heart-sink…dredged, trawled, tangled, in knots
this un-holy horror I honour.
I stalk the Aldinga shoreline
where the wind whips my face
foam creeps in seaweed clumps frothing
blue-finned fish grey the ground
while Qwan Yin stands sentinel above Sellicks
compassion Goddess’
vessel of divine nectar seems arrested
white garments billowing stiff
But I muse on Sedna
ice maiden, ocean Goddess, slow-moving planetoid beyond Pluto
she dwells profound fathoms deep
abandoned, wounded, betrayed
naked, cold, enraged
her father fled on the surface after his cowardly attack
her dismembered fingers sprout fishes, seals, walrus and whales
she nets… all hurts, all fears, all trauma
so do not shirk
hers is the touch of death
seep into deeps
linger in oblivion, lips blue and trembling
feel her embrace handless, overwhelming
descend full throated, nothing left on the surface, nothing safe…
sink
sink
engulfed in her body
her eyes wide and wild
fill with whale song breaching, body resounding
shell, cochlea, drum, shamanic healing heart… singing
stroke her skin, cradle her head, comb her tangled tresses
release the refuse of centuries, cultures that kill
without consequence, without ceremony
through the grapevines, over the scarp, into the scrub
lean into listening, linking arms, lighting lanterns
birth prolific fishes
bring pearls to the surface round as globes orbiting our Sun
realise that everything is interconnected
everything created crafted with care
quantum, fractal
numinous web of life woven
inside us and out, in every breath we share
know that everything animate and inanimate
is sentient, sensing our kindness, our kinship, our cherishing
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