Waltzing Matilda leads us around the stage. Lots of laughter, stumbling steps and fun times. You have to listen to all the verses to know what this song remembers. Those nights under the southern stars with stories of a jumbuck in the billabong and swagmen on the watch-out. It’s a story of escape no matter where, of fools who follow and ghosts still heard, waltzing Matilda with me.

another world 

all the possibilities 
with names that don’t match 

could I only go there 
just the clothes on my back 
and the tea in my pack 

—Short-listed Finalist in MacQ’s Cheribun Challenge #3

Peggy Bilbro’s

roots are in the U.S. West but she has lived in the southern U.S. for more than 50 years, both of which help shape her writing. Her poetry reflects her life-long interest in the large and small miracles of the world, from dust-bunnies to star-dust, from mouse holes to black holes. She finds pleasure in the creative challenge of translating those miracles into poetry. Her writing has been published in Contemporary Haibun Online, Drifting Sands Haibun, MacQueen’s Quinterly, and Modern Haiku.