Recent Work Press

14/09/2025

‘In the thirteen years since his Collected Poems, Paolo Totaro has written as much poetry as he did in the sixty preceding years. This new book collates that remarkable yield. Totaro’s wit, the breadth of his intellectual interests and the variety of his expressive modes are undiminished. The poetry insists on life for life’s sake.’
From the Introduction by Theodore Ell

06/09/2025

In this volume of prose poetry, five poets approach grief in different ways; the emotion sometimes recognisable, sometimes disguised. Their works grieve for those who are gone while they traverse the idea of the abiding presence of loss. If a melancholy sense of absence is occasionally registered in these poems, there is humour too. And, more generally, there are many salutary expressions of grief-inflected yet powerfully present feelings of love and desire.

19/08/2025

Another quality Recent Work Reading. Thanks Jacqui Malins and Maggie Shapley.

14/08/2025

Join us at Smith’s Alternative for an inspiring evening of poetry with RWP poets Jacqui Malins and Maggie Shapley. They’ll be reading from their compelling new collections, GERT and Fruits of Exile — an event celebrating creativity, language, and the power of poetic storytelling. Don’t miss it!

12/08/2025

10/08/2025

Each poem in Maggie Shapley's Fruits of Exile is a window into moments of loss, longing, and quiet triumph—whether in the ache of distance, the rituals of domesticity, or the search for belonging. With lyrical clarity and deep empathy, Shapley’s collection invites readers to reflect on what it means to leave, to stay, and to find home in unexpected places.

31/07/2025

In 1924 near Queenstown, Tasmania, a boy holds a gun with a black cockatoo perched on it, while a young woman stands beside him, holding two dead cockatoos. Artist and poet Jacqui Malins was captivated by this image. GERT is her non-fiction narrative poetry collection exploring the intertwined stories of this woman and the place she lived—a vivid journey through history, identity, and landscape.

15/07/2025

A moving and high quality night of poetry. Featuring Moya Pacey and Brendan Ryan, supported by a rich and varied open mic. Nice.

10/07/2025

Poetry lovers, don’t miss this! 🎤 Join us at Smith’s Alternative for a night of powerful verse with RWP poets Brendan Ryan and Moya Pacey. Brendan will share work from his latest collection What It Feels Like, and Moya brings decades of poetic insight and passion for women’s voices. Plus, an open mic—3 mins per reader, sign-ups on the night. Free entry. Come early, stay inspired. ✍️📚

13/06/2025

'What if Feels Like' brings together poems published over the past twenty-five years from Brendan Ryan’s seven poetry collections, as well as introducing thirty new poems. This is a poetry of empathy and longing, elegies and portraits written with a gentle irony. 'What it Feels Like' is an essential contribution to ‘the tradition of hard pastoral’ in contemporary Australian poetry.

12/06/2025

Yay!

07/06/2025

James Lucas’ second collection suggests that the incongruous may be our best avenue to insight. These meticulously crafted poems reveal again and again that neither our pasts nor our present are as we’ve been told.