The Odesa – UNESCO City of Literature Office continues to build bridges between UNESCO Cities of Literature and Odessa, fostering dialogue, exchange, and shared literary experience across cultures.
In 2008, Melbourne joined the UNESCO Creative Cities Network when it was designated the second City of Literature in the world. Melbourne’s designation as a UNESCO City of Literature is acknowledgment of the breadth, depth and vibrancy of the city’s literary culture. Melbourne supports a diverse range of writers, a prosperous publishing industry, a successful culture of independent bookselling, a wide variety of literary organisations and a healthy culture of reading and engagement in events and festivals.
"Australia continues to stand in solidarity with Ukraine, offering humanitarian aid, military assistance, and strong diplomatic support in the face of ongoing aggression. This collaboration is part of a broader commitment to uphold democratic values, cultural resilience, and freedom of expression under extraordinary pressure," said David Ryding, the founding Director of the Melbourne UNESCO City of Literature Office.
Please, meet Aries M. Gacutan.
Aries M. Gacutan is a poet and digital creator working on the traditional lands of the Woiwurrung and Boonwurrung people of the Kulin nation. They also do a bunch of other artsy things for money. They currently write about space/place, migrant identity and digital ephemerality. In 2024, they were a recipient of the Emerging Poets Residency in 2024 with Red Room Poetry, and currently facilitate Toolkits: Digital Storytelling with Express Media. Read about their dastardly poetic escapades at thearieszone.neocities.com.
We invite you to listen to the poem performed by the author:
epiphany on the evening shift
in this economy the priest needs to be a barista!
he slings hot foam & makes the sign of the cross
over sour macchiatos—the stray cats hear his piping voice
& wander in from the streets
“how the hell are we!!!” he says to the tabby—gives the calico
her almond latte. sings a ditty
with the siamese (“congrats on the baby, best wishes
to the happy couple”)—privately, he hopes to die
having gone to more weddings than funerals
the priest loves & laughs, the priest vapes & fucks
the priest has learned long ago to leave his shame in the grass
he laughs at me when i struggle with the wine for table 6
“there’s a trick to it,” he tells me
“there’s a trick to it but i’ll never tell”
i tell him i’m going to the bathroom
& i shout at my hands so loudly it rings through the walls
when i come back he hands me a drink, no questions asked
& tells me about a leaf he found yesterday
as big as your head!—holds up his own hand
to illustrate. a customer thinks he’s waving to them
unsure, they wave back
my family passes down religion like a gift card
on christmas—like a tree dropping its leaves to the asphalt
prayer is a cousin twenty years my senior
i’ve never been to a funeral
“how was mecca?” i ask my dad—
he shrugs off the question as if it’s a coat
& he has just come in out of the cold
“it was good”
good: like pasta
good: like god
it’s autumn now
& soon the trees will bare their bones to the sky
& flex their fingers under sunset’s orange glow
i have decided that people who work by a lake are luckier than most—that
people shouting at you for dumb shit is inevitable
that putting up the chairs at the end of the day is inevitable
but that getting to see a rainbow is not
i tell the priest about my view of the sky from the floor
& he smiles & presses his palms to his chest
like his own ribs are the warmest things that have ever been
“this is my favourite part,” he confesses to me
when all the customers are gone. “i love to see it”
—the lights above the lake
the lights across the hanging glassware
the lights above the entire world
.
The project was created by the Odesa UNESCO City of Literature and being implemented with funds raised by Reykjavík Bókmenntaborg UNESCO as part of the readings initiated by Milano City of Literature “Not Just Words” (Reading for Odessa) on February 24, 2024.
