Gillian Southgate: prize winner in The Oldie literary competition

Congratulations to Gillian whose entry for The Oldie's monthly literary competition is published in the April issue, now out. The brief was to write a poem called "First Time in the Country" Here is her prize-winning poem:

First Time in the Country

So this was Australia. There was so much light

I thought the sky had rinsed itself away.  There were cockatoos

In the eucalypts, yellow legged and crested. They might

Have known me; they watched with heads on side

As if they would impart a secret. And like a bride

The oleanders flowered white in tumbled tiers.

A Christmas beetle, iridescent green, banged his small hide

Against a window; the blue

Of sapphires clothed the vault of sky.

The red gums blossomed, sweet and redolent

Of an old land, from whence my people came.

The birds looked down. One of them spoke my name.