Written 17th August, 2026 for the visual art competition
Banksia seeds look like grumpy old men as portrayed in Snugglepot and Snugglepie by May Gibbs
He wears a heavy coat of rusty fur, hunched and brooding in the coastal scrub. They painted him a villain in the nursery tales, a big, bad shadow waiting for the dark. He has a hundred hollow eyes that never blink, carved open by the jaws of summer fire. A crooked spine, a fist of woody knots, grumbling low curses to the southerly wind. But who could blame his wicked, jagged grin? He learned his roughness from the searing drought, patrolling the ashes of a blackened world while delicate soft gums slept in the canopy. He is the grumpy elder of the heath, bristling, thick-skinned, and unapologetic— holding his seeds like stolen golden treasure behind those silent, gaping wooden mouths.
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