the cool change is nice, brings a party wind over the city. A party wind gives you a sword and a party boy at the after party snaps the sword in two. how is this possible? How indeed is it Impossible.     ꕥ     Flowers are like poems about parties…… Beauty arrives but not in her chariot.     ꕥ     like when Jesus made those fish out of nothing but you are the fish     ꕥ     are you slouching toward brunswick west? are you cringing toward freedom? are you well? was it GOOD? is it ever?—     ꕥ     no real ‘POEMS,’ that’s for sure..., fictional strolls down fictional storm drains... non-fiction that's full of LIES... graffiti, meal ideas... NO poems!     ꕥ     I take the bus straight from work to the party.     ꕥ     NO VAPING IN THE LOUNGE     ꕥ     The bestselling author pads around the corner and offers us a tray of cake. Tall layered slices festooned with floral clusters and creamy whirls.     ꕥ     I loved saying that my girlfriend was in prison.     ꕥ     i only wrote my previous book of poems to quit the scholarship the university granted me it’s not easy being solipsistic daddy poems fail from the sky & you can too     ꕥ     YOU’RE NOT PLANNING TO BECOME A POET ARE YOU     ꕥ     get glum whenever i picture my teenage self walking in and out of rooms at parties looking at people i knew &/or didn’t know then walking into the ill-lit gardens of those parties & looking at more people i knew &/or didn’t know & then stepping back into those rooms at parties & looking intently at the people i had looked at before now laughing w/ the other people i knew &/or didn’t know in harsh light it’s the same as the current me that walks into pubs & looks intently at grown-ups i know &/or don’t know / the me who walks into parks at dusk & looks at more grown-ups laughing w/ other grown-ups i know &/or don’t know the me that spirits back into those pubs and looks maybe less intently    a dim globe / so as not to freak them out as they too laugh & carry on being other people     ꕥ     Aye yah, sally die, larping Toorak homo, Arabunna metal lira.     ꕥ     Aye yah, try aye: ‘L,’ sepo dealer, oz cure, me dad Laz. Multi-tuzla?     ꕥ     yes! the government sucks!     ꕥ     I’m attending two separate parties tomorrow, and so is Leah, which I learned this morning when we exchanged trinkets, and walked around the park. I was gifted a fancy lychee coconut water and Leah got an orange (in surplus from a produce box delivery) and a third of a yard of scrap fabric I found in a bin at a store in Haight Ashbery over a year ago, which had been sitting in my knitting box all this time. Life is not a party, it’s a bitch and then you die, that’s why we get high, according to Nas or Elzhi if that’s the version you have      ꕥ    The detective observed unopened beer bottles in a bathtub consistent with the bathtub being used as an ice bucket for a party      ꕥ    What is this need to spend thousands of dollars to come to the other side of the world to disagree with people about literature? Aren’t there plenty of people to disagree with at home? Wouldn’t it be better to lie alone in a studio listening to streamed music that costs little or nothing?     ꕥ     
ABOUT

Sick Leave was founded in 2018 by Harry Reid, Ursula Robinson-Shaw and Gareth Morgan. 


        It began as a monthly reading series held upstairs at the Gasometer Hotel, in Collingwood, Melbourne. Image: Collingwood House, 2023.





Our first journal was independently published at the end of that year. In 2021, we crowdfunded the purchase of an Adana letterpress first owned by Vagabond (now housed at the Institute of Postcolonial Studies in North Melbourne).






Image: Collingwood House, Mar 2024.




In 2026, we will publish our first two full length titles by Patrick Hunn and Abigail Fisher, in partnership with Glom Press.




        Image: From Of all people, Leah Muddle, 2023






DIRECTORSGareth Morgan
Harry Reid
Ursula Robinson-Shaw

COLLABORATORS
Glom Press
Zoe Hannay

STOCKISTS
Brunswick Bound
Readings Carlton
Paperback Books

CONTACTsickleave99@gmail.com










“Sick Leave is at the cutting edge of having fun.”


—Sally Olds





Sick Leave is currently open for submissions for The Long Poem until 31 Jan
Submit to sickleave99@gmail.com | subject line “The Long Poem”


© sick leave, 2025 
website by zoe