[for Margaret]
The children sit
Beside the swamp
And chatter at their ease
Devouring their food
As the first great feast.
Their voices ring on high
Like a Kookaburra’s laugh.
A snake slides across the littered green.
For thousand of years
These chirruping souls
Have sat at the waters edge
And channelled their spirit sky
Its long thin clouds
Praising their weathered ways.
The centuries of slaughter and disease
The canker of dispossession
Have not erased this benediction.
O wondrous child
O beauteous bud
Your dark limbs fathom the waters deep
Your smile controls the moon:
You still map the one indivisible world.
Gar Jones: November 2016
The children sit
Beside the swamp
And chatter at their ease
Devouring their food
As the first great feast.
Their voices ring on high
Like a Kookaburra’s laugh.
A snake slides across the littered green.
For thousand of years
These chirruping souls
Have sat at the waters edge
And channelled their spirit sky
Its long thin clouds
Praising their weathered ways.
The centuries of slaughter and disease
The canker of dispossession
Have not erased this benediction.
O wondrous child
O beauteous bud
Your dark limbs fathom the waters deep
Your smile controls the moon:
You still map the one indivisible world.
Gar Jones: November 2016