As we celebrate Christmas Day, we reprise James Walton’s poem which reflects upon the meaning of Christmas.
Almanac (Poetic) Life: Christmas Eve
December 24, 2025 by 6 Comments
This beaut little poem from John Gordon will touch those who are tallying up the years. As we reprise it three years down the track, John’s poem also encourages us to contemplate what John Harms calls ‘the simplicity and complexity’ of the Christmas season.
Almanac Poetry: Had a Better Offer
December 22, 2025 by Leave a Comment
Domestic cats have particular requirements when it comes to where they choose to live, according to this week’s previously unpublished poem from Kevin Densley.
Almanac Music: ‘Carnivalesque’ – Songs Referencing Carnivals, Circuses, Parades and the Like
December 19, 2025 by 87 Comments
The latest installment in KD’s long-running series on popular song themes is songs involving carnivalesque material – in other words, songs referencing carnivals, circuses, parades and the like. As is always the case, readers’ song choices and comments are warmly welcomed.
red wheelbarrow in the manner of Paul Gauguin’s Vision after the Sermon
December 15, 2025 by Leave a Comment
This Monday’s poem, according to Kevin Densley is “what I see happening when William Carlos Williams often parodied modernist poem, ‘The Red Wheelbarrow’, meets a well-known painting by Gauguin.”
Almanac Memoir: Queer, Sultry Summer
December 8, 2025 by 32 Comments
John Lennon was shot dead forty-five years ago today, December 8. In this previously unpublished short memoir by Kevin Densley (possibly the first chapter of a book-length work, he says), he paints a vivid picture of the impact upon him of Lennon’s murder on the day – combined with a portrayal of central Melbourne in 1980, and other issues in his own life around that time. [A few names of actual people involved have been changed – Ed.]
Almanac Poetry: A Disguised Version of a Repressed Wish
December 1, 2025 by 2 Comments
Sigmund Freud famously described dreams as a disguised version of a repressed wish. Today’s poem by Kevin Densley is a jokey take on this idea.
Almanac Poetry: Old Regret
November 24, 2025 by Leave a Comment
‘There was movement at the station…’ This previously unpublished poem from KD takes as its point of departure the name of the stallion mentioned in Banjo Paterson’s famous poem ‘The Man from Snowy River’.
Almanac Music: ‘Calling Occupants’ – Songs Involving Planets
November 21, 2025 by 91 Comments
The latest installment in KD’s popular music odyssey concerns songs involving planets. As is always the case, readers’ song choices and comments are warmly welcomed.
Almanac Poetry (and Cricket): Wide long on
November 17, 2025 by 1 Comment
John Gordon recalls the changes that mark the passing cricket seasons of a players years – from the full-on investment of youth to a fading presence in the later years until a time beyond the boundary line calls.
Almanac Poetry: Backyard Internationals
November 14, 2025 by 2 Comments
Glenn Butcher re-produces a poem he wrote before the Ashes series of 2010-11 reflecting the ‘backyard internationals’ he played with his brother..
Almanac Poetry: Gough
November 12, 2025 by 4 Comments
‘He was a tall man, he was a very tall man’, states Michael Pardy with one of his thoughts in his poem, ‘Gough’.
The Bishop, the Nun and the Matador
November 11, 2025 by 2 Comments
A poem from Damian Ballasone about a bishop, a nun, and a matador.
Almanac Poetry: Ann Arbor, Michigan
November 10, 2025 by 4 Comments
What’s in a name? Sometimes everything. Some place names are beautiful in themselves, this week’s poem by Kevin Densley concerns one of them.
Almanac Poetry: Cracker Night
November 4, 2025 by 24 Comments
Kevin Densley remembers that one night of the year – November 5th – when many parents allowed their kids the recreational use of small, dangerous explosives … (worthy of reprising – ed)
Almanac Poetry: ‘The Race That Stopped A Nation’ by Patrick Smith
November 4, 2025 by Leave a Comment
Today is the running of one of the world’s greatest horse races, The Melbourne Cup. Patrick Smith recalls in verse the circumstances surrounding Damien Oliver’s win on Media Puzzle in 2002, ‘The Race That Stopped A Nation’.
Almanac Poetry: The Story of Fisher’s Ghost Creek
November 3, 2025 by 5 Comments
‘Tis the season (of sorts); Kevin Densley follows on from his spooky Halloween poem with a reprise of an older work on Fisher’s Ghost Creek.
Almanac Poetry: All Hallows’ Eve
October 31, 2025 by 5 Comments
On October 31, for a number of years now, Kevin Densley has posted a Halloween poem on the Almanac website – here’s his latest one, written very recently. The poem offers a take on the spiritual, as opposed to gimmicky, side of All Hallows’ Eve.
The Gambler
October 28, 2025 by 7 Comments
As it is Spring Carnival time we reprise a selection of verse from Damian Balassone related to the pros and cons of ‘The Gambler’. The selection was first first published in 2024.
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