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Thylazine: The Australian Journal of Arts, Ethics & Literature                                                                                                                                    #1/thyla1k-sj AUSTRALIAN POETS SERIES 1 The Poetry of Sandy Jeffs Selected by Coral Hull [Above] Photo of Sandy Jeffs by Robyn Adams, 1999. I Feline Love I Facade I You Took Her I Silence of the Lambs I Standing Stone I Feline Love For Trish When a feline beauty curls its furred body upon my lap smooching its elegance lounging languidly in the midst of my curious enduring love I think of you, Mum. In every fickle feline sovereign that has graced my home there has been a piece of you an undying reservoir of love that has overflowed with a raucous joy. I have devoured your joy of cats. This tiny morsel of you affords a deep connection to your lost soul. I sit in the calm and stroke the smooth fur of a purring majesty. I draw your beckoning soul's outstretched hand to mine. I grasp this transcendence; it is all I have left of the wasteland that was you. Facade We played happy family presented ourselves as normal sanitised our image deluded ourselves with lies. Something was rotting in our family. Playing happy family was a full time job. Going to school with the screams and punches playing themselves over in my mind while pretending to be happy was a killer. Something was rotting in our family. Mum stayed indoors for days powdered her bruised face nursed her battered body sent me on messages made up excuses. He brought her cups of coffee pretended nothing had happened. Something was rotting in our family. Yet still I pretended to be happy. In the end my heart watched in dazed disbelief while my family rotted knowing no one could smell the stench. You Took Her You took her crushing her paper wings. You took her smothering her sobs. You took her after beating her. You took her after abusing her. You took her in twisted lust. You took her in blind rage. You took her without consent. You took her! You took her! Daddy, when you took Mummy you took me. The Silence of the Lambs Shorn of our wool laid bare for the vultures' talons not even the tar on our wounds could stem the flow and we bled and bled in silence. Silence is golden In loyalty we uttered nothing choked on what we witnessed children struck dumb unable to tell the terror and we bled and bled in silence. Silence is golden We cursed the house of horrors we lived in endless fear our lives were shackled to a nightmare we dare not name and we bled and bled in silence. Silence is golden Lambs waiting for the slaughter we bled and bled in silence. Silence is golden Silence is Silence Standing Stone I stand before your coffin stony and cold while the mingling few mourn your moment. Absent from this place of mourning I weather your death like tall stones in the mist refuse to crumble. Standing stones do not weep even though they carry great burdens. I will stand a thousand years and more and still be unmoved standing solitary and tall in my strength. About the Poet Sandy Jeffs Sandy Jeffs grew up in Ballarat. She graduated from La Trobe University with an Arts Degree in 1975. When she was 23 she had her first psychotic episode and has lived with schizophrenia. Her first book, Poems from the Madhouse, published by Spinifex Press in 1993, was awarded 2nd place in the 1993 FAW Anne Elder Poetry Award, as well as a Certificate of Commendation in the 1994 Human Rights Awards. Sandy is a co-author of Loose Kangaroos, Domain Press 1998, which also won a Certificate of Commendation in the 1998 Human Rights Awards. Loose Kangaroos is also the name of a group of sanity-challenged poets with whom she performs her poetry. Sandy is involved in the humorous documentation of the travails of ladies' midweek tennis, the subject of a forthcoming book called Confessions of a Midweek Lady. Spinifex Press are soon to publish a new book of poems Blood Relations. Sandy lives with her friends and animals on the outskirts of Melbourne.    [Above] Photo of Sandy Jeffs by Robyn Adams, 1999. I Next I Back I Exit I Thylazine No.1 (March, 2000)