Hi everyone. My name is Kerry Gittins and I’ve agreed to step into the very big and very hard to fill shoes of Jeanie Axton, our former site Administrator. I’m a retired music teacher and teacher librarian and have been writing picture books, short stories and poetry for the past ten years. I’ve had some stories and poems published online in anthologies, magazines, and showcased in local exhibitions, but I’ve yet to crack the elusive traditional publishing market! You can find out more about me on my author site The Book Tree. Jeanie has done an amazing job at showcasing Australian poetry through this site for the past five years and I hope both regular and new poets will continue, or being to contribute, their work. I’m excited (and a bit nervous!) to take on the administrator role but look forward to receiving, reading and posting your wonderful poems. Please take note of this new email address to contact me and to send your poems to as of Monday June 5, 2023: ozchildrenspoetry@gmail.com

“Poetry is eternal graffiti written in the heart of everyone.”
Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Good Evening,

I would like to take this opportunity to let you know we have found a new administrator for the Australian Children’s Poetry Website. Kerry Gittins will be taking over the site from Monday. I wish her all the best in this and look forwards to seeing where she takes this valuable and treasured resource.

I would like to thank you all for your support and words of encouragement in the five years I have been the administrator. I have had a number of regulars who have committed themselves to writing and helped keep the site going and thriving with contributions .

All the best to you all in your individual writing endeavours. Let us all keep writing to support Kerry in her new role to keep poetry and especially Australian Children’s Poetry alive.

Thank-you All

Regards

Jeanie Axton

I met a man with seven heads

Who had to sleep in seven beds.

But even worse, he had five legs,

Which an urgent question begs:

Can five legs fit on seven beds,

Or should he lose two of his heads?

All That Is Left by Dianne Bates

Why did the tree die?
Did it reach a grand old age?
Or did sharp axe cuts
Make its sap
Bleed down the bark
Onto the dry earth?

Years later it still stands                                                                                                                                       Defiant
Its gnarled branches
Clawing at heaven.