Friendly Street Anthology 48 – Mimesis, was launched on Monday, 5th Augus, 2024, at the Box Factory in Adelaide to a full house. Judge Mike Ladd, a founding member of Friendly Street Poets, a widely published poet and former producer of ABC’s Radio National programme Poetica, awarded the Satura Prize to Helen Hutton for Going Home, a poem which addresses the insidious and socially silent crime of Domestic Violence but which is finally in the social and literary zeitgeist. Helen also won the Satura Prize last year for her poem, For Grace, in Anthology 47, Round the Bend, edited by Veronica and David Cookson.
Photograph by Martin Christmas.
Mike awarded Satura Prize Commendations to: The Baby Locket, by Cary Hamlyn, Mass by Rory Harris, Memory Bone Soup by Maria Koukouvas (Vouis), Dementia Ward Wishlist by Judy Dally, Piano by Louise Nicholas, Lot 22 by Valerie Volk, Nature on the Table by Heather Nimmo, and The Art Teacher by Helen Parsons.
The Nova Prize for first time readers and published poets went to poet by Peter Mahoney who also won a place in the Friendly Street New Poets 24, judged by Jude Aquilina.
Editors Maria Koukouvas and Rob Ferris, who was unfortunately unable to attend due to illness, chose a larger than usual selection of commended poems for the anthology simply because we believed there was a large body of poems which deserved a guernsey. This makes Mimesis a longer anthology than usual and with its stunning wrap around cover, A Pair of Mimic Octopi, supplied by artist Julia Wakefield, the book makes a good, long read as well as a plush coffee table display.
Photograph by Maria Koukouvas.
Photograph by Martin Christmas
We were able to enjoy a few nibbles, a drink and some mingling after the event which added sparkle to the night and an opportunity to reflect on the process and wins.
Thank you to Martin Christmas for his professional photography on the night and his generosity. Thanks also to Helen Hutton, who was the whip-smart publication editor. All the professional skills donated by the editors, poets and the Friendly Street Poets’ volunteer staff make Friendly Street hard copy publications possible and polished.
Here is Helen Hutton’s Satura Prize winning poem.
Going home
Helen Hutton
Like an afterthought, the sinking sun strikes
the rear view mirror and pushes me
past Norseman towards sleepless nights.
Cloudless skies — endless monochrome blue
stretch above the monotone Nullarbor.
The rusted car is a capsule of regret.
I flinch as stones flick against the cracked windscreen
like fists in my face.
The fan belt shreds, strained
with too much work, too little love.
Emus scatter, dance in the stony dust
flat-footed ballerinas dodging collisions.
Toddler strapped in the backseat
baby in my belly we wait
for a truckie with a pure heart
and a well-stocked toolbox.
Roadhouse squats in the simmering heat
stale pies, brown water from the blocked shower head.
Coins in the ashtray rattle like broken chains
not enough for a room.
We sleep in the car under an orchestra of stars.
The ferrous sunrise catches my son’s hair
like a speckled dream.
We hit the broken bitumen
race against time
Eucla, Ceduna, on past Port Pirie …
We’re going home.