And it is - marching on. Time, I mean. It's been a busy six weeks since I last updated this column. Back then, I was musing over COVID and chances of launching my new book. By now I've faced the realities of this corona virus world, and decided that a proper formal book launch really isn't viable. I'm sad to miss out on the CEO of the Cancer Council SA, whose willingness to guest speak at a launch for Marking Time - A Chronicle of Cancer I'd very much appreciated. He and his Promotions Director have been so helpful and supportive about this book that they reinforce my belief that it could indeed be of real value to anyone on the cancer journey. Yet even more than being a book about cancer, it's a book about relationships, and the importance of love in all our lives. Someone suggested that a better sub-title might have been 'A love story.' Simon Bartlett's beautiful art photographs accompany each poem, and  the book is an art as as well as a poetry production.

So, reluctantly, I abandoned the idea of a big launch. Instead, it's available for online buying on this website, and I'm trying to get it into bookshops. Dymocks also have been very supportive, and I'm starting to get bookings on a number of radio programs and also as guest speaker in organisations and libraries. But marketing is hard work and totally exhausting. Sad result is that I've done very little new writing, and that's a frustration for me. I just hope that Facebook and word of mouth may publicise and sell copies of this book - I genuinely believe it has a lot to offer readers, and the feedback so far has been most enthusiastic. That's reassuring!

We did, however, manage a mini-launch (Trybooking, limited numbers and carefully distanced seating) of the 2019 Friendly Street Poets anthology, number 44, which I'd co-edited with Nigel Ford. Kaleidoscope is a lovely book, with some superb poetry by so many of Adelaide's best poets, and a monthly art photograph prefacing each section. Nigel and I look at it with a sense of pride and pleasure, and are just so glad that it's finally been released. The planned April 7 launch was of course a COVID victim, but September 7 was a long-awaited joy.

We look ahead, and wonder what the future holds. Safe, so far, in South Australia,  we watch with horror unfolding events in other countries, and feel for Victorians in their total lock-down.  It's worth our taking the precautions we do, and we need to resist complacency. Even as we enjoy normal life here, and once more get to restaurants, theatres, concerts, it's with the recognition that life is different - and everything is precarious.