Rochford Street Review was sadden to learn of the death of Joan Cahill. David Gilbey, President, Booranga Writers’ Centre, provided the following tribute to Joan.

---

Members of Booranga Writers’ Centre are sad at the passing of our friend and fellow writer, Joan Cahill. Joan was for many years a valued committee member and contributed poems to our annual anthology of new writing, fourW, from 2006-2023. Joan won a number of awards for her poetry including First Prize in the 2012 Melbourne Poets Union’s Urban Realism Award and First Prize in the FAWNS Regional Vibrant Verse competition, 2013. Her poems were published in anthologies such as Opal Shores (2005), A Feast of Poetry (2010), Short and Twisted (2011), The Daily Advertiser (2012), Memory Weaving Anthology (2013) and Brio (FAWQ, 2015).  In 2008, Joan had been awarded a LitLink Residency at Varuna, the National Writers’ House. Perhaps her major literary achievements were her two stylish collections of poetry, Buddha’s Left Foot (2016) and The Whirling Dervish (2022). Both collections are heart-warming in their embrace of humanity, art and the rich suggestivity of language. Her poetry comes alive with an immediate sense of her speaking voice, travelling the world, observing quirky innuendoes in ordinary situations, inscribing personal experience and ekphrastic sensibility into judicious, poised (mostly free) verse. Joan was an energetic, creative, problem-solving force to be reckoned with who wrote with humour, insight, compassion and wry maturity. We loved her and miss her and send her beloved extended family our sincere condolences.