Featured ImageAbove: Created by Copilot and me.
Winds outside and storms within. Nature shifting, people shifting, and a song that carries the ache of distance. A small piece for looking outward, and inward, at the same time.
Don’t Open the Venetian Blinds
Turbulent seas,
And broken trees
Nature’s wild winds –
Do spellbind mankind’s
Undefined minds.
Buckled knees,
And breaks in the bay’s
Protective quays
Nature’s stone-blind to mankind’s
Redesigned minds.
Ivor Steven © January 2026
Over at Weekly Prompts, the Weekend Challenge is the word ‘Journal.’ To visit their fabulous site, please click >> Here
“This morning’s muse — wings caught mid-thought.”
My Journal’s Wings
High above my poetic eye I fly,
where the early birds gracefully glide by
across the bright morning sky.
And in my journal, I pause to ask why
birds become the muses of my word supply—
as if their wings remind me
that thought itself is a kind of flight,
and every line I write
is another way of learning
how to rise.
Ivor Steven © January 2026
A whispered protest beneath a heavy sky—this poem emerged over coffee and quiet defiance.
No More Alibis
I shyly worry, and quietly sigh
about today’s ugly, dark sky.
In the blink of an eye,
the sun might say, “Hi”
and the world awry,
could be rectified.
No more alibis,
or black eyes.
It’s time to notify
the blow-dried wise guy:
The world is not his money supply
We will not be tongue-tied,
nor listen to his falsified
“War cry.”
Ivor Steven © January 2026
Featured Image Above: Created by Copilot and me.
An image and song that drifts along the same edge this poem explores — between light, shadow, and the unknown.
What Colour is the Edge?
I ask myself,
Is there an edge?
Is it the golden sun rising,
or the hessian sun setting?
Is it the dark horizon
beyond the deep blue ocean?
Then I wonder,
What is the edge?
Is it the black chasm
beyond the starry universe,
or is it the white light
when time sees no night?
Ivor Steven © January 2026
Please note the featured photo and attached photos above are taken from Street Art in the Geelong CBD
Today’s Throwback Friday poem (originally written in January 2025) is drawn from my upcoming book, Time Hears No Sound. It appears as the first poem in the Fantasy section of Chapter 9, Humour, Fantasy, and Fairyland: Timeless
A Blade of Light
Far beyond my darkest night
Clambering out of purgatory’s deepest void
I grasp onto a single blade of light
On the edge of my soulless asteroid
Who rescues me from Armageddon’s endless fight
Awaking in a pool of sweat, just after midnight
This meaningless nightmare gave me a hellish fright
.
Until Eyes Hear Sound
Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)
Perceptions:
Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)
Tullawalla:
Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books
OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com … and I can send you a PayPal account,
for the Book, plus Postage.
Ivor Steven © January 2026
It’s Market Day this Saturday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
* Our popular monthly markets are all undercover at Centrepoint Arcade on the third Saturday of every month.
* They feature art, unique goods from local makers, second-hand goods, plants, books, and more.
* There are also open art studios, Yesterday Vintage, Untether Gallery, HBT Collectables, and the May’d Shop.
All at, Centrepoint Arcade
132 Little Malop St, Geelong
From 11 am to 3 pm
And I’ll be there with ‘Frankie’ and my “New Bookstall Set-up“
Ivor Steven (c) Jan 2026
A small reflection on the strange path from understanding to uncertainty, and the fragile line between what feels real and what feels lost.
On the Edge of Finality
Physically,
and enigmatically,
Scaling life’s realities
has critically
reached obscurity.
Combined with humanity’s
vanity, inanity, and insanity
and lack of morality –
brutally –
finality
is not an impossibility.
Ivor Steven © January 2026
Where Theo’s tiny tomato and shy seedlings work their quiet miracles… with one curious assistant nearby.
An Anti-depressant Pill, or, Theo’s First Tomato
Lately, my mind has been wandering,
and my tired old quill is meandering
between the lines of my poignant writings.
I’ve been anxiously worrying
about our weary, war-torn world.
In the morning, I gave my ink well
an anti-depressant pill.
The good Doctor Who had prescribed
a relaxing dose of courtyard gardening.
The effervescent tonic worked miracles.
Today, Theo* has produced his first baby tomato,
and my recently planted sunflower seeds
have sprouted into healthy little seedlings.
And the courtyard whispered,
‘There you are… stay awhile.’
*Theo the Tomato bush, who started his miraculous journey late in May, the beginning of our winter.
Ivor Steven © January 2026
“Arrival of the Birds” by The Cinematic Orchestra felt like the natural companion — a quiet swell of hope beneath the magpies’ wings.
Unstable Weather
Behind closed doors,
Below the first floor,
Far beyond braided Russia leather,
They shelter from the unstable weather.
Nature’s hierarchy walks together –
Black and white birds of a feather –
And untethered, they will fly forever,
Above the world’s war-weary heather.
Ivor Steven © January 2026
Gigi’s poem >> https://gigisrantsandraves.wordpress.com/2025/12/30/have-you-noticed , opened a familiar ache — the sense of being small inside a vast, grinding system. This poem rose from that feeling, with Lisa O’Neill’s “Rock The Machine” humming at its edges.
Why Worry?
Government – Corporate piracy –
Rife everywhere in our binary society.
Ironically, our privacy is *actively*
The policy of every dynasty’s refinery.
Corruption: slavery, bribery, impiety.
And privately, I worry about the impropriety,
The calamity’s spidery finality.
Ivor Steven © January 2026
Ivor.Plumber/Poet 