Lakshmi Kanchi

VP: Hi there. My name is Vuma Phiri, coming to you from Centre for Stories in Boorloo/Perth 

Today we present to you Swanbourne Story Tracks: stories of personal connections to the areas between Freshwater Bay, Lake Claremont, and the Indian Ocean. Some storytellers have been residents of the Swanbourne, Claremont and Cottesloe areas; others have profound memories from passing through these streets at some point in their lives. 

In collaboration with Town Team Movement and Project Mooro, Centre for Stories captured these experiences of connection to community and place on Whadjuk Nyungar boodjar. We pay our respect to Whadjuk Elders, and all Aboriginal people from the beginning, who are the knowledge-keepers and custodians of this place. 

In this episode, you will hear Lakshmi Kanchi’s story. Lakshmi is an emerging, prize-winning Indian Australian poet and storyteller on a mission—to make poetry accessible. She is the author of “Lakesong”, her debut poetry collection, published by Centre for Stories, and has been published in several journals and anthologies. This is Lakshmi 

LK: Hello. Good evening. How’s everyone doing? It’s such a beautiful evening and I’m really privileged to be here sharing my story with you. I want you to trust me and close your eyes for just a minute and imagine with me a quaint little wooden house with stained glass windows. It’s a very little house with wooden steps and floorboards that creak underfoot with brass, embellishments, doorknobs, and lamps, and whatnots, that glimmer with a patina of age and ware. This is the Mattie Furphy House in Swanbourne. It sits across the oval, nestled between a clump of trees and a patch of wilderness. I’ll ask you to open your eyes now. I arrived in Australia back in 2016 with a heart full of dreams chasing after my own version of the Australian Dream. And I was equipped with a PR Visa, and I was armed with skills and qualifications that I thought would land me a job almost anywhere. I had a bachelor’s degree in engineering backed by a swanky MBA from a German university and years of corporate experience. “So,” I thought “easy peas-y, I’d land a job.” But after months and months of toiling and searching for something suitable, I found myself feeling utterly deflated and frustrated. 

Now, at the time, I hadn’t realized that a part of the struggle was my own doing, was my own hesitation, my reluctance to step back into the life I had always lived. A life I found to be unfulfilling and unrewarding. For years, I had poured my energy into the corporate machine that gave back so very little that cared, so very little. And I thought, what about me? What did I want? Back in India, I had very little choice. I became a version of Laksh that my parents, my siblings, my friends, my family, and even my society expected. But what about Laksh herself? What did she want? Australia. Australia arrived in my life like a breath of fresh air. I felt truly free and liberated. I was no longer boxed into expectations. I was free to choose. I was no longer caught up in the cycle of making bad decisions, chasing after unwanted things. I could do my own thing. I had done my own thing. I had left that place. I had come here and this, this place could be home. At this juncture in my story, I met Mattie Furphy House, and I began to take the first steps towards the life I sort of envisioned; the person I sort of wanted to be. I wasn’t sure, but I thought, you know, this is what I could do. I thought I could be a person who created and was creative, a person who found joy in poetry and storytelling. 

And right enough, I began to take the first steps towards this life at Mattie Furphy House with a writerly masterclass, which is actually a writing, a series of writing workshops that happened there. Now, I don’t know if you’ve been there to the Mattie Furphy house, but if not, I urge you to give it a visit. It’s absolutely beautiful. Hauntingly beautiful. The house grew on me just as I was growing into the person that I wanted to be. Imagine again, the stained-glass windows exquisite in their detail with kangaroo paws, red and green, embellished, stunning. In fact, every little detail from the timber beams to the decorative touches, everything was made by hand. A legacy of the arts and crafts movement where handmade craftsmanship was celebrated. So, when I was in the house, I found myself filled with awe and inspiration. I wanted to make. I wanted to create. I wanted to surround myself with people who were fueled by creativity. And so, Mattie Furphy House became more than a venue for workshops. It became my sanctuary. It became a place where time slowed down, where I could hear my thoughts amidst the rustle of gum leaves 

Where every creek of the floorboard was an affirmation that I was moving in the right direction, taking the right steps towards the life that I wanted, but didn’t know how to claim. Of course, unknown to me. Change was happening slowly, gradually, but definitely like careful brush strokes on an old canvas. It was happening all the time. I began to attend more and more workshops. I began to attend events, connecting with a huge community of writers, exchanging ideas, swapping stories, but more importantly, listening. Listening to the people who lived and breathed creativity. Now, one such day, I found myself sitting outside the house on the steps, just as the sun was setting and there were amber hues in the sky. It was a gorgeous evening, and I thought to myself, what about this person that I’m chasing. This person, this girl, and that I’m so desperate to find. She wasn’t emerging, she wasn’t hidden from sight. She was always here, just waiting for me to notice her. And I did. This particular moment in my journey was profound. It had a profound effect. Something shifted and I actually began to write in earnest, not just scribble in my notebook, make drafts in my journal, but craft poetry. Poetry that was deep and meaningful, poetry that carried the weight of my past and the promise of my future. 

One such day, I took one of these poems and I submitted it to a competition on a whim, and I forgot all about it. And then one day I received an email with a subject line, “Congratulations!”. 

Wow. That was extraordinary. Who would’ve believed it? I was going to be published. I know, I know. It’s not big news and it’s not going to make it to the news. It’s not that I won a grand prize, but it was proof that what I was doing was real, was concrete. The life that I was building so carefully, you know, blood, sweat, and tears, brick by brick, was in fact real. That this place was an in fact my home. Not the place where I was born in. Not the life I had always lived and then left behind, but this place, the space that I had carved out, the home that I had made for my words, for my poetry, for my stories that were waiting to be told. And I was finally here and ready to tell them, thank you so much. 

VP: Thank you for listening. This story collection was funded by Town Team Movement and Project Mooro and produced by Centre for Stories.  

Centre for Stories is a not-for-profit organization with charitable status. Our team is small and nimble, and we love what we do. To help us to continue to support diverse storytellers, consider a small donation. You can donate at centreforstories.com. 

This podcast was produced by Centre for Stories with story training from Colin Archibald, and sound engineering by Mason Vellios. Thank you.