At times the poetry is more detached, as in the sexy exploration of Brett Whitely (“brett whitely, Internuncio”), which is a completely different piece spoken than it is on paper. Here we lose the arrangement of words, with the slightly ironic notations on the left hand side, and gain the actual delivery in those tones. In many ways, without those notes, this poem becomes almost overly rich – slurping at the marrow or fornicating through collage. It’s as visual as a Whitely painting, but done in words, looking at process as art, rather than the finished product.

A number of poems on this work also have the addition of music. Alfred Abraham is the muso behind Eliades' words, and his work is superbly matched to the poems. Although the backing music is striking at times, combining percussion with strings in a way that creates its own non-verbal meaning, the music always allows the words to lead, emphasising the increase in intensity, or bringing the pieces back towards contemplation. It is always a complimentary, rather than competing force. "essence and form" is one piece that is so well engineered, that it changes from an tight analytical poem to one which is lyrical enough to be a true song. It helps that Eliades is a talented performer, and moves beautifully between the whispered, slightly detached paternal opening and closing, and the intense intimacy in the middle ("self saturated turmoil"). The poem moves in great waves — literal and metaphoric — between drowning and swimming. I liked the poem when I first read it in the book, but listening to it with Eliades echoing vocals and the Red Hot Chili Peppers sounding guitar riff that drives it along, is a whole new experience. As with all of the poems, Eliades' enunciation is exact, and his renditions bring out the strength of each carefully chosen word, the rhymes and alliterations, creating new meaning. As with much of Eliades’ work, this poem is both reflective and subjective – both about the personal struggle for meaning, and the way an artist makes meaning with art. The metaphoric and literal are perfectly balanced, and the experience of listening to this as a song is extremely powerful. This is definitely one that belongs on the radio.

"episodic memory for two voices" is also a completely new experience, extended through the hypnotic percussion and guitar, and the very subtle inclusion of the additional vocals of Vanessa Lee. So well blended is Vanessa’s voice that I couldn’t hear it – but I did note the slightly richer, deeper sound as the work progressed. In this poem, singular and plural stanzas alternate, creating a new space in that gap between individual struggle and collective meaning. In the verbal version, we lose the neat positioning of words on a page, but we gain the vocal spaces, and the poem is stretched out by repeated musical refrains. The ending to this poem is handled superbly as the music drives us towards the most wonderfully drawn out “flow”.