And dug my fingers in the sand

And dug my fingers in the sand

Author	Brook Emery
Language	English
Genre	Poetry collection
Publisher	Five Islands Press
Publication date	2000
Publication place	Australia
Media type	Print
Pages	110pp.
ISBN	0864186428
Dewey Decimal	A821.4
Followed by	Misplaced Heart

and dug my fingers in the sand(2000) is a collection of poetry by the Australian writer Brook Emery. ^{[a] [1] [2]}

Contents

The collection contains 51 poems.

• "and dug my fingers in the sand"
• "King Lear at Nambucca Heads, 1988"
• "Seascape I"
• "Fruit Salad"
• "Infidelity"
• "Song of Songs 5 : 2"
• "Breathing and the Wind"
• "lithosphere"
• "Crossing The Border"
• "Demeter"
• "Pinball Rider"
• "Near Brooklyn"
• "Daylight Saving"
• "Improvising With Flaubert"
• "Cowboys"
• "My Father's Eyes"
• "Shellac"
• "With My Father-in-Law"
• "Abstract"
• "She"
• "A Twist Of Hemp"
• "The Distance and the Heat"
• "Interstices"
• "Postcards"
• "Driving Home"
• "Being done, there is no pause"
• "Learning to Dive"
• "Physical"
• "Approaching the Edge"
• "Imagined Seas"
• "Geometry"
• "Friday Night"
• "Interior with Windows"
• "What's Left Out"
• "April"
• "Flags crack and wrap"
• "Kato (HD - 1220)"
• "Rear Window"
• "any and all means"
• "Taking Stock"
• "The Next Step"
• "Three Feet"
• "Milgate's Dog"
• "Pure Mathematics"
• "Skink"
• "The Pelican Poem"
• "Beat Once More"
• "Letter to a Live Poet"
• "Underfoot"
• "feather, stone, bird, sand"
• "At A Slight Angle"
• "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth"

Awards

• 1998 – The Denis Butler Memorial Award, for the poem The Distance and the Heat. ^[3]
• 1999 – The Australian Sports Poetry Award, for the poem Physical. ^[4]
• 1999 – $15,000 Newcastle Poetry Prize , for the poem Approaching the Edge. ^[5]
• 2000 – Second Prize, Fellowship of Australian Writers' Anne Elder Poetry Award (for a first book of poetry) for his collection and dug my fingers in the sand. ^[6]
• 2001 – $15,000 Judith Wright Calanthe Award for Poetry, Queensland Premier's Literary Awards for the collection and dug my fingers in the sand. ^[7]

Also, another four of the collection's items had been recognized:

• "Postcards" — runner up, 1999 Banjo Paterson Writing Award. ^[8]
• "lithosphere" — commended, 1999 Robert Harris Ulitarra Poetry Prize. ^[8]
• "any and all means" — commended, 1998 Tom Collins Poetry Prize. ^[8]
• "Imagined Seas" — short-listed, 1998 Josephine Ulrick Poetry Prize. ^[8]

Critical reception

The collection has been reviewed. ^{[9] [10] [11] [12] [13]}

Notes

1. "To get past big waves, swim underneath them ... In open water races competitive swimmers will hold the sea floor, digging their fingers into the sand and using this handhold to propel themselves forward underwater, letting the wave pass overhead. Holding on to the sea floor stabilises your position ... " (Kate Rew, "How to Swim under and through Waves", p.20 in Rew, Kate (2022), The Outdoor Swimmer's Handbook: Collected Wisdom on the Art, Sport and Science of Outdoor Swimming, Random House UK. ISBN   978-1-8460-4728-2)

See also

• 2000 in Australian literature
• 2000 in poetry

Footnotes

1. "And dug my fingers in the sand / Brook Emery", National Library of Australia.
2. When interviewed in 2013, Emery not only observed that "much of my writing is about the sea", but also that "I've been a surfer all my life and both my books [viz., and dug my fingers in the sand (2000), and Misplaced Heart (2003)] are full of the sea and the surf" ("Writers' Sucesses Celebrated, Uninews, University of Newcastle Australia, (October 2003), p. 12.); and, in 2016, he stressed that, as a surfer, he was "a body surfer rather than a boardrider" ("Adapted for Land—A Lungfish writes the Sea", Plumwood Mountain Journal, Vol.3, No.1, February 2016).
3. Emery, Brook (2000), "The Distance and the Heat", Cordite Poetry Review, Nos.6-7, (2000), p. 30.
4. Emery, Brook (2000), "Physical", Antipodes, Vol.14, No.2, (December 2000), p. 133 (JSTOR   41958113).
5. First published at pp. 11-15 of Pretty, Ron (ed.) (1999), The Argument from Desire: The 1999 Newcastle Poetry Prize Anthology, Wollongong, NSW: Five Islands Press, 1999. ISBN   978-0-8641-8567-9
6. Results of the 2000 National Literary Awards: Part 1 — Book Awards: FAW Anne Elder Poetry Award (for a first book of poetry), Fellowship of Australian Writers.
7. Beatty (2001).
8. See: Emery, Brook (2000), "Acknowledgements", at p.iv of his and dug my fingers in the sand, Five Islands Press.
9. Maiden, Jennifer (2000), "A Poet of Processes", Australian Book Review, No.225, (October 2000), p. 53.
10. p. 112 of Urquhart, Alan (2001), "New Poetry", Westerly, Vol.46, (November 2001), pp. 109-125.
11. Jennifer Harrison and Ian McBryde, Judges' report, Fellowship of Australian Writers' Anne Elder Poetry Award 2000, at Results of the 2000 National Literary Awards: Part 1 — Book Awards: FAW Anne Elder Poetry Award (for a first book of poetry), Fellowship of Australian Writers.
12. Persson, Sheryl (2005), "Other Seas", Five Bells, Vol.12, No.3, (June 2005), pp. 12-16.
13. Blackhawk, John (2006), "Brook Emery: And Dug My Fingers in the Sand", Five Bells, Vol.13, No.3, (June 2006), pp. 18-20.

References

• Beattie, Peter (2001), "Ministerial Statement (18 October 2001)", Legislative Assembly Hansard, Queensland.

External links

• And dug my fingers in the sand at AustLit