During my time at the Wheeler Centre Hotdesk Fellowship in 2014, I worked on a group of poems inspired by Australian-based visual artists who explore themes of movement and migration. The poems investigate ideas such as: what are the impulses behind why people feel the need to move from one place to another? What do people leave behind? What are the motivations for travel?

I chose artworks as an access point because they can provide alternative ways to explore these complex themes. I took the artwork, and my personal response to the artwork, as a starting point for the poem. In some cases the poem then takes off on a tangent that might not closely resemble the original artwork. Through this associational and creative journey, I sought to offer a dynamic view of the challenges people face when travelling from one place to another.

The poems have since been published in a number of journals.