Deb Stewart - Poet

03/09/2026

During August, I participated in the Red Room Poetry 30in30 event where poets were asked to respond to a daily poetry prompt with 3 lines of poetry. I thought I would share my 30 responses here. Most were written in a few minutes so they are pretty raw. I cheated on a couple and pinched / rewrote lines from my previous poems. One was a visual response so I linked to my 'Decipher Me' morse code poem. I haven't shared the prompts here - you can find them on the Red Room Poetry page if you scroll through the August posts. :-)

Red Room Poetry prompt responses August 1st – 31st 2026

#1 Snuggled close to your body, I feel safe and connected.
Something beyond the warmth of flesh moves in me
sparking each cell with the delight of contentment

#2 Metal claws grip grasp my pale, smooth trunk. Lift me skyward / like a matchstick striking sun. I was once a proud ghost gum. / Now my amputated roots remember earth’s safe embrace.

#3 A multitude of mid-North road trips
memories laid out like yellow canola fields
of rich red earth, rural fences and dusty wooled sheep

#4 This loss is a tearing of flesh and spirit / I carry him still, like an ancestor breathing in my cells / a beautiful spirit child nuzzling at my breast

#5 I am a blue wren trapped in a silk glove / When I tear these imprisoning threads disguised as love / I’ll peck out your eyes and leave you for dead.

#6 “How to Make Love”
Pour a good measure of Shiraz into cut crystal glasses /
Stir fry cornucopia of colourful veggies with a little tofu or meat /
Taste the flavours, savour the juices, undress and eat.

#7 If heavy rain and broken lipstick weren’t enough to ruin my chances /
Or the spilled cappuccino on my white blouse, and snapped shoe strap /
The head of the panel was my ex-husband who was a louse and always made my day crap!

#8 My hands are still. I no longer care to tell the time /
or concern myself with a finite future. This is my blank face /
of bliss not punctuating days and nights. Every second is potentially mine.

#9 Four months since my father died, I question apparitions and signs. / The answer - a 10-year-old birthday card tucked in the back of a Bible, / bearing a love note from him, falling free from its binding on Mum’s birthday.

#10 Keep your fake tears and suffocating hugs, you’ll no longer betray me /
I should have walked away in high school but that best friend bu****it played me /
There’ll be no more back stabbing. I’m taking your knife to cut you out of my life.

#11 We’re thrilled that you can make it to our Christmas do!
Please bring coleslaw, potato salad and crusty bread plus a drink
Oh, can we borrow your decorations and lights? Ours are on the blink.

#12 Taxi runs red light. Yellow Camira spins wildly. Shattered glass. A write off. /
Poet passengers lurch. Whiplash. Peacock bruised eye. Writers Week /
must wait. Cracked sternum. My daughter hugs me tight. Fearing death.

#13 Retirement is my second innings. An opportunity to do as I please.
Life, however, spin bowls at my knees and time keeps wicket.
Will I ever get my debut novel finished so I can pitch?

#14 Today, my music is silence. Space between songs.
Noise cancelling headphones seal me from the world.
Later, I will play Mozart but for now I relish no sound.

#15 Canola blooms canary yellow /
fields like wings of sunlit joy, lure me/
back to capture first with camera then with naked eye.

#16 https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1741214697116768&set=a.697078758197039 Decipher Me (Morse Code) – cheat poem

#17 Amniotic atmosphere incubates all /
life is the thread that connects /
human and animal hearts with the pulse of nature.

#18 Contentment wrapped in lovely music, an eternal /
life of perpetual bliss. Orchestral manoeuvres in the dark /
the soundtrack set to miss my mark.

#19 Knipeeler, dance in my fingers, flense /
vegetable skin into strips and curls. /
Sharp and snazzy as a chef, chop and dice with speed.

#20 White gloss tiles behind hotplates glare blankly. Your absence. / I stir the pot, wear steam on my lenses, stare through thin clouds /
A shift of light. Your figure an apparition reflected. Just in time for lunch.

#21 Rats in the tea chest are eating your words, /
gnawing at loose - bound pages yellow as teeth. Rats /
in the attic are digesting ideas. Fat with philosophies, crazy with intent.

#22 I hang on the studio wall, all curves and neck, fretting /
for your fingertips to glide over my strings, work up a rhythm, /
make my sound hole sing chords of major bliss and minor sorrow.

#23 Does the right hand know what the left twin scribbles/
under A4 sheets, in semi-dark, consciousness unwinding, /
as light slowly shivers alive to make its nonsensical mark?

#24 Solo in Singapore, 2013. Breakfast at the Pan Pacific. /
Smooth exotic taste of pale green Sri Kaya on my toast. /
Home in South Australia, the fruitless search for local Pandan leaves to replicate its flavour.

#25 Mon chéri in see through purple plastic, always by my side /
I reach for you on waking, riding sh***un in our love mobile /
My lips fit neatly round your spout. I drink in your elixir to hydrate me.

#26 A talking serpent is the stuff of Disney. Flickering tongue, evil eye. /
I watch for shining scales near the compost heap as I cast the rotting apple. /
Ophiolatry reveres your holy nature. Beauty and evil exist in the rebirth of shed skin.

#27 Lake wavelets swoosh suckling sand /
sing ti-ara, ti-ara slowly to softly wavering reeds. Galahs rip /
tin sky screeching. Pelican snaps sun rays like glittering fish.

#28 Her voice, vibrato, moved with the oscillation of ocean waves
The sea could not fathom her ethereal melodies
but swayed like a dancer keeping time to mermaid tune
its swirling skirts whipping to the crescendo of her song
roaring ocean applause failed to drown sweet cadences
belonging to no one but a moment in time and aural perception.

(Only first 3 lines posted. Inspired by ‘The Idea of Order at Key West’ by Wallace Stevens)

#29 Oh, oh f***. Walls spin I’m down on plush carpet volcano vomiting / Rattling gurney. Wobbling sky. The rough ride to emergency. / They throw back my head. Two nurses playing catch. Reset crystals in my ears.

#30 Memory pulled by bully tides. Crush tumbled. Weight of water. / Seaweed in my mouth. Jeans wet and tight around knees. Scream stifled. / The future terror of lonely beaches. Fascination with marine life lost.

16/08/2026

12/08/2026

I had a poem published in the August issue of the Milang Community News.

12/08/2026

The most recent issue of Park Poetry, featuring Renate Homburg.

by Renate Homburg

01/08/2026

28/07/2026

The 'Sweet Things' chapbook I've been working on seems to have morphed into a verse novel with a slightly different title. Looking forward to seeing where it goes. :-)

15/07/2026

Do you have a poem about the Adelaide Park Lands? Submission details for the Adelaide Park Lands Association newsletter / blog are below:

11/07/2026

We scattered my father's ashes yesterday morning. It was a lovely day, despite being windy and cold. Here's a little poem I wrote the day before, for the occasion.

It’s too soon to write this poem, Dad
to find words that encompass your life
to express all that you were
and all that you are to us.

It’s too soon to be saying goodbye
to scatter all that is left
besides memories of you
that will never die.

But we must let you go
into the wind we hope is gentle
and the sand that is older than us all
it is time for release.

Let the rhythms of the ocean
be your cradle
and the clouds watch over you
as they pass.

We leave you with the divinity of nature
and the glory of your God.

Let sunrises bathe you in light from the East
let sunsets over the ocean remind us
of the joy and colour you brought to our lives
that you were here for too short a time
but assured us you “have had a wonderful life”.

Thank you for all that you were and all that you gave.
Now rest, Dad, in the eternity of our love
as we whisper Goodbye and hold you in our hearts.

Deb Stewart (Dad passed away in April 2026)

30/05/2026

And tonight's poem is "Sugar Hit"

Sugar Hit

I’m tired and need a sugar hit
after a night with no sleep.
It’s the day after Shrove Tuesday
I’m imagining pancakes
with lashings of cream
and blueberries
sprinkled with sugar
shaved chocolate
and maple syrup –
Overkill right?

I missed my gym session
this morning, the guilt kicks in
like a boot to a punching bag
I should be kind to myself
allow my tastebuds
the simple pleasure
of sweet, syrupy pancakes.

Instead, I reach for mini rice cakes
thinly coated with Belgian chocolate
only 17 calories per bite.
I rip the bag open
devour the lot.
I don’t add up the calories
So much for the energy in
energy out equation.

The need for sugar
tries to convince me of failure
the only deficit
is in my lack of satisfaction.
I am not winning.

(c) Deb Stewart

13/03/2026

[POEM] Okey dokey...I wrote a little "hip op" poem today LOL

My Hip Op

After many years of stiffness and pain,
Of feeling foreshortened, walking with unusual gait,
having to sit mid walk and wait for relief
I accepted the suggestion of a new hip

Now I have a catalogue of artificial bits
Bone plug, Femoral Head, and Bone Screws
All wrapped and secured in Bone Cement
To add to the old dental surgery - titanium screws in my chin

The “hip op” was a success, at least I seem to be on the mend
But there are several things I cannot do, like twist or bend, or run a race
and right now, I suck at s*x
Glad it’s day 11 and the pain is mostly a soft throb
I carry like a slumbering child I don’t want to wake

On the first night, a nurse asked if I’d expected so much pain
NO! It was almost more than I could bear. Definitely 11 out of 10
A result perhaps of bone spurs the surgeon had to chisel off
Before he could cut away the cranky old joint and do his thing

But each day, with the aid of painkillers, ice and a little w**e
I’m feeling better and doing fine, learning ways to sit and move
That don’t hit too hard and ring the bell of pain
I worship the walker, pick up stick and pouches of ice gel

and my husband who keeps me sane
as I lumber though each day, on a mantra of how good it will eventually be
Not yet in the heavenly realms of full recovery
but trusting the walking stick to support me
up the slow stairs out of Hell.

Deb Stewart