harmless drudge

5 Islands Press authors Kai Jensen and Elizabeth Walton will be the featured poets at the monthly Booranga Writers Centre poetry reading on Friday 17 April. Elizabeth's book, How to Read a City, is hot from the press, published just last month. Victorian poet Dani Netherclift has called her book “a call to urgent action” that is “also a love letter for what is still present, precious and possible”. Kai Jensen's book, The Zebra Path of Tree Light , was published last year. This accomplished...

By a very happy coincidence, Australian Book Review chose to publish Mark Tredinnick's excellent essay on Robert Gray in the same week as 5 Islands Press opened submissions the 2026 Robert Gray Prize for poetry. Mark, as some of you will know, knew Robert Gray well, and was a great admirer and promoter of his work. Last year, he conceived, coordinated and edited Bright Crockery Days —a festschrift in Gray's honour. Twenty-four literary luminaries each contributed an essay on a poem that had...

Submissions are now open for the 2026 Robert Gray Prize for Poetry, offering a $5000 cash prize and publication in Oystercatcher Three for shortlisted poems. Deadline: May 18 at 11:59 pm. Following the extremely enthusiastic response to the inaugural Robert Gray Prize for Poetry last year, 5Islands Press is again offering the prize, which we hope will be a fixture of the Australian poetry calendar. View the full terms and conditions here . Or go straight to the entry form by clicking the...