Proof of launch

Here we have some photographic evidence of what’s come to be known as “the Melbourne launch” of The Third Fruit is a Bird, hosted by the gorgeous folk at the Sticky Institute.

My hat is doffed to all of the people who braved the heat to come along and play despite the sweat and faintheadedness that a forty-plus day inspires. Thanks for showing, and a big “I totally understand” to all of those who stayed away.

I think the crowd peaked at a dozen, which made for a very intimate event that at times made me feel like I had just got up at a good friend’s party to start reciting my own poetry, but I perservered.

Before I did my reading the delovely Justin Heazelwood (aka The Bedroom Philosopher) favoured us all with three songs from his amazingly captivating and humourous repertoire, including “The Happiest Boy” – my favouritest of his songs – which you can watch in all its animated filmclippy goodness over here on YouTube.

Once Justin had charmed and placated the audience in just the right way,  I took full advantage of the mood and read a selection of poems from The Third Fruit is a Bird, stopping short of reading all of them. Hey – it’s 24 pages. That’s not a massive amount of poetry…

The whole crap-shoot was done and dusted by about 6, and people didn’t linger long afterwards, including myself. I actually managed to catch the 7.15pm train back to Castlemaine and get home more than an hour earlier than Anna was expecting me, which meant I was able to help out with the kids’ bedtime routine after all.

So I got to be a bohemian and poetic dude in an underground (literally) zine shop as well as a conscientious dad all in the one night. Bonus.