2026 Hot Desk Extract
As part of The Wheeler Centre’s Hot Desk Fellowship program, Tayla Richardson worked on her interdisciplinary poetry memoir entitled The String that goes Unseen. This collection follows the thread linking fractured memories of a young woman’s growth through ‘survival mode’, to grieving and thriving in a body that weakens and paralyses with movement. Interlacing free verse, experimental and concrete poetry, with visual art and film.
This poem and companion short film ANTEROOM lay at the hinge point of the manuscript, a transitional entryway, in which time moves differently.
Lost in the echo between beats. Silence pulsating, pounding
the inner ears. We linger in this rhythmic pause, automatic
anatomic, inhospitable to patience. Marshmallow
walls stare blankly, sickly sticky primed
to dissolve me as we sink into the sea
of chairs, weighted with anticipation
peeling from vinyl concaved by a longer than
intended stay. Collectively pretending we don’t hear
the whispered sobs, the frantic calls, that pierce the antiseptic
air like acid rain, smothering mumbled sitcom repeats. Give them
a sense of normalcy, a distraction. Give them company. Give them
incessant instrumental music that itch nerves already frayed. We
fidget with the ache of stagnation, arms crossed comforting
the lonely. Chins drooped gazing at phones, at floors,
at shoes; work boots, high tops, Jimmy Choos.
Lined up, like we have our ducks in a row
when we all know if you’re here
your ducks have flown the coop.
Flickering fluorescents hum
filtering mirages through floaters
as we count tiles, trace lines, re-tracing
steps of masked figures through a labyrinth of
unmarked doors. Recirculating breath breeds hunger for
uncontaminated air, misleading the parched. I can fast no longer.
I compartmentalise, dislocating myself into parts, expanding my
reach until my fingertips graze the corner of this page in hopes
to one day turn it myself. The chapter would read:
the before. Before what, I’m still unsure.
Tayla Richardson
Tayla Richardson is a poet, multidisciplinary artist, writer, filmmaker, actor and disability advocate living on Bunurong land. She creates to connect and untangle perceptions of ambiguous loss, hope and impermanence, drawing on her experience living with a rare neuromuscular condition. Her work has featured in local and international film festivals, exhibitions across Melbourne, online with RUSSH magazine, Writers Victoria, EWF and 2025 Grieve Project, amongst others. She was the winner and subsequent Jury member of a University of Sydney Art Prize for people with disabilities, a Judge for Casey Council’s Youth Writing Competition, runner up in the 2025 Poetry D’Amour, and winner of the Best Screenwriter Award at the 2025 ‘Focus on Ability’ Film Festival. Tayla is currently writing her debut poetry memoir, an interdisciplinary work supported by a Creative Victoria grant, Mother Tongue ‘Rising Voices’ Fellowship and Varuna ‘The Writer’s Space online’ Fellowship.