Robert Lee (Robbie) Coburn – July 24 2016

Robbie is a contemporary Australian poet. His work is largely drawn from personal experience, such as his struggles with depression, self-harm, alcohol abuse, bulimia nervosa and suicidal ideation. He writes frequently about farm life, with predominant themes of greyhound racing and training, family, isolation and the emotional hardships of living in rural Australia, and he writes primarily in free verse, using striking imagery and personal reflections to evoke the landscape and humanity’s connection to it. Poet Les Wicks has called him “the best portraitist of Australian rural life since Brendan Ryan”. One of the youngest published poets in Australia, when he was 17 years old, Robbie’s poem ‘Two Lies in Sequence’ appeared in Pi O’s literary journal Unusual Work. Robbie is also a fiction writer, editor, essayist, playwright and critic. Already a prolific writer, he has two new books on the horizon: a new collection of poetry, The Other Flesh, and a novel, Conversation with Skin. Robbie has published several chapbooks and pamphlets, his latest chapbook being Mad Songs.

Rain Season
Picaro Press, 2013; ISBN 9781921691652
‘Stay tuned! Nothing prepares you for the shock of a new voice in poetry, and nothing quenches that thirst better than a good dose of poetry. A poetry of place and sensibility can light up a whole landscape, and the poetry of Robbie Coburn does just that. In these poems we see him now in the very act of etching out the details, so hold on, and read on through.’ – .o.
‘A very convincing multifaceted portrayal of the struggle with self and others, one that uses its contrasting imagery and analogy so well.’ – Ashley Capes

Human Batteries
Picaro Press, 2012; ISBN 9781921691515
‘Home suspended on brass hinges,
I ignore all motion. Alive.
My hands have disappeared in front of me –
There is beauty in that.’
Consisting of works both diverse and experimental in form, Human Batteries is the first release from Victorian poet, Robbie Coburn.