JEM TYLEY-MILLER
PUBLISHED WORK
235 Winter 2019
With the mast in one hand, I clutch my last Vegemite sandwich in the other as I search for the island. Squinting through warm spray, I see it rise in the distance, beckoning from across the heaving sea. My replica Viking færing will make it – fashioned from the most robust plastics I could find. Still, as I surge forward and my fingers slip and slide, I wish I’d built in a seatbelt. Swallowing the sandwich, I whip my design pad from its bag and shield it from the spray before adding to my section on improvements.
December 12th 2018
When Rory burst into our lives, he was an angry pink and already knew how to complain. I should have smothered him right there, taken a pillow from behind Mum’s matted wet hair, saving us all. And I would have, had she ever left his side. Instead I was forced to endure him, to direct my hatred instead toward the blowflies buzzing inside the window ledge, while she repeated over and over, ‘Isn’t he the most beautiful thing you have ever seen?’
Margaret River Press, 2019
In the latest anthology in the annual Margaret River Short Story Competition, contemporary concerns, such as climate change, cultural inclusiveness and the need for queer spaces, are explored and a spotlight is shone on the complex emotions that we sometimes fail to honour in our daily lives and close relationships.