Dorothy Simmons: Writer and Author
Below you'll find an animated video of On the Hour by Dorothy Simmons, featuring music by Mimi Kind and narration by Stephanie King.
My microliterature piece On the Hour was published online and also appears in Spineless Wonders' collection of microfiction 'Out of Place' (2012).
It is excerpted from my book, 'Living Like A Kelly', which reimagines the life of Ned Kelly's mother and was published by Australian Scholarly Publishing in 2015.
Here is the text.
On The Hour
on the hour
you'll be on your way
you'll be walking down that corridor
putting one
foot in front of the other
breathing in
breathing out
listening
your body
what's it saying
your good body
blood and bone
raced horses
felled timber
hammered nails
danced jigs
dripped sweat
swam creeks
stamped
shivered
cursed
sang
held squalling babies
as tenderly as bleeding men
your body
that you'll be walking
into a room
it'll never walk out of
how
can you do that
set one foot
in front of the other
up to the drop
look the
drop
you'll be holding
out your hands
to be pinioned
flexing your fingers
long strong sinewy fingers
always kept your nails clean
now
bending your
neck for that rough collar
like you bent it for me to kiss
goodbye
my fingers stroking
the soft hair at the nape
like they used to stroke the
soft down where
the bones hadn't set
your fingers were chubby then
kneading my breast as you latched on
kneading
eyes shut
bliss
but open now
awake
wide awake
under the hood
what do you see my son
what do you say
die like a kelly
die
like a kelly
Read my interview with Spineless Wonders about why I wrote it here or purchase 'Living Like A Kelly' here.
Die Like a Kelly Cartoon Video