Rhiannon Mickan teaches high school English and Humanities, recites “Jabberwocky” like a Speech and Drama prize depends on it, and defiantly pronounces the word “plant” like a Tasmanian, despite having lived on the Mainland for almost thirty years. She is truly terrible at karaoke, but loves to sing anyway. She is equally terrible at art, but has decided that one of the better things about growing old is that the care-factor of impressing people drops dramatically after age 45ish. She hopes she is an OK writer. We’ll see.
Decease Aloma is a haunting and deeply evocative collection of poetic prose that explores childhood, memory, and the fragile boundaries between love and fear. Told through the eyes of Tarby, a young girl navigating a world of contradictions, the work blends lyrical storytelling with raw emotional truth. Set against a backdrop of domestic tension and fleeting moments of tenderness, these pieces capture the quiet resilience of a child trying to make sense of instability, secrecy, and unspoken pain. From shadow-filled hallways to rare glimpses of warmth—a sugared orange, a gentle embrace—the narrative reveals how beauty and trauma can coexist in the same breath. Mickan’s writing is vivid, unsettling, and profoundly human, weaving together memory, imagination, and survival into a tapestry that lingers long after the final page.
