Sharlene Allsopp

Sharlene Allsopp was born and raised on unceded Bundjalung Country into the Olive mob. She was a 2020–21 fellow in The Wheeler Centre’s Next Chapter program. Her work has been published widely, including in Jacaranda Journal, Portside Review and Aniko Press. Her debut novel, The Great Undoing, is published by Ultimo Press.

Articles

Glitter and guts

All those years I had been excluded from the Anzac narrative because the Defence Act had outlawed Black enlistment. Lest we forget morphs into satire when you uncover the depths of collective amnesia surrounding Black service in World War I and Black resistance since colonisation. The more accurate catchphrase would be Best we forget. How can we be ‘one’ when we are not allowed to remember equally? Nostalgia is selective about remembrance.

On undoing

Non-fictionI am forty before I visit Europe, still ignorant that a century before me my great-grandfather had walked those same cobblestones. That he had fought in a war that did not reward him with any meaningful welcome on his return home. Now that I know, I yearn to go back and breathe that air, knowing that William was there.

They cannot say their thoughts
(or, If Cohen sang Oodgeroo)

PoetryDance me to the rhythm of a language (I don’t speak) ’Neath sapphire-misted mountains they might kill (ya) Breathe out brokin holy in this land of (rainbow peaks) Every line she speaks is hallelujah.

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