It was, for the moment, their song. They liked it because they’d discovered it, because it wasn’t whatever the rest of their classmates were tuning in to. Because it wasn’t U2. ‘Wo-ah, we’re halfway there!’ The lyrics echoed their own desperate fixation on the future.
The sea and the wind and the open sky all there inside the song.
Azlan Jahan, post 1947-48 Kashmiri War Fiction by Zainab Nasim The gramophone resounds in the galleries of the haveli, stirring it awake. As the needle twirled around delicately on the vinyl, he closed his eyes softly settling comfortably into his rocking chair with his stack of letters and a lit cigar. “It is not like I am not proud to be a martyr’s father, Bittoo ," he said to his grandson.
Fiction by Jesse Maskell Falls Festival, Victoria, 2016 The best moments are supposed to be ahead but this is it. In five hours I’ll be head-in-an-ocean Chemical Brothers play Wide Open 40 minutes into their set and I’ll look around for Karti, Caitos, through the dim flashing crowd seeing iconic hero friends in moments.
David Wilson, of our partner site The Footy Almanac, writes of shifting youthful dreams: beach, cricket, a girl. And a dose of Paul Kelly.
Fiction by Tom Lodewyke Eazy-Clean Laundromat, Sydney, 2015 Steven checked his phone. Nothing. Sometimes Rachel still texted him when there was no way around it. He craved the loud bling of his message tone. He was careful not to reply straight away, though.
Fiction by Alicia Sometimes A beach. Aberdare Mountain Ranges, Kenya. Mt Hakone-yama, Japan. Together they spent weeks lifting a woofer on top of the Aberdare Mountain Ranges in Kenya.
Holly Ringland Runaway Bay, Australia 1994; Surfers Paradise, Australia 1999; Vancouver Island 2003; Central Desert of Australia 2007 I always think I’m imagining it, but the beam of his torch is steady and true as it bounces over the shrubs, making phosphorescence of the spinifex.
Fiction by John Weldon Traffic lights, Melbourne. September 2010 It was completely meaningless, totally shallow and absolutely without any relevance to anything going on in my life. Perfect.
Fiction by Stephen Kimber A country town, outside a dance, night. Out of pure ignorance I'd done something right. She smiled at me.