Cirrus@Austlit

'It is a prejudice that I think we can already see in Herodotus that there is something prized but also irredeemable about a Gorgon’s head, and in particular Medusa’s mortal one, and it treads a narrow bridge between arrestingly beautiful (illustrations of which coalesce around neo-spiritual work) and grotesque (a few of these, but classically, Caravaggio). And though I recognise that the preceding references are already unwieldy it would be impossible not to mention, (in passing), the utility of the sublime which I think helps to bridge the slippages between gorgeous (I see now, close to Gorgon) and terrible, which are adjectives used (at times interchangeably) to convey the Medusa.'  (Introduction)

'Antonia Pont’s debut collection of poetry, You Will Not Know in Advance What You’ll Feel came out with the Rabbit Poets Series at the end of 2019. I went to her launch, where Antonia read in response to poems that her friends had written in reply to poems in her book. Antonia is one of those people writing poetry in Australia whom you may not have heard of – even though she’s been working at this craft for many years. Antonia is not only a poet, but an essayist, an educator of writing and literature at Deakin University, and a yoga teacher. Antonia founded her own yoga school in 2009 and is one of those people who has a very particular, very special, perspective on life. Antonia says things like: ‘you only want to lose your “self” once you’ve got one’. In this interview, Antonia speaks about the vicious momentum of trying. She also says things like: ‘writing needs a body that functions’. In describing how she spent time in the 2020 lockdowns, Antonia mentions steadiness laziness, pleasure, and kindness.' (Introduction)