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OUTBACK DREAMING
Highly commended by judges in this year's Winton Swagman awards
The Outback of Australia is our unofficial state,
though her boundaries are vague and ill-defined;
and every Outback visitor's regarded as her mate:
she's a shiralee, our Outback state of mind.
Her emblem is a ghost gum by a parched and patient stream,
her vision is a distant purple range;
her theme is sung by cockatoos and pitched in joyous scream …
her soul is dusk when moods and colours change.
Out beyond the back of Bourke and farthest blackened stump,
where flies make off with waterbags and sand goannas jump,
where once the deadly hunting spears and boomerangs were hurled,
there is an Outback dreaming place; the centre of our world.
By day the Outback spirits rinse our stars in Reckitt's blue,
then whisk each dripping phantom off to dry;
they're showcased in the evenings where they sparkle bright and new –
around a Cross, within our southern sky.
The tourist tones of yidakis and rhythmic snap of feet
re-live for us those pantomimes of old,
when keepers of the Outback weaved their magic from the beat
and changed in form, as tales of life were told.
Edging sheer escarpments bearing Mimi art displays,
where frilled-necks bluff their stalkers and our flying foxes laze,
beyond the horns and whistles and the bands with batons twirled,
a soul can find its great escape, in respite from the world.
Our land of poor and plenty in the never-ending show
has boom or bust dependence on the rains;
with skull and carcass tragedies picked clean by drought and crow,
or floral carpets smothering her plains.
A million breeding waterbirds may fish her ancient shores,
when salt lakes drown in sudden seas of flood;
but silence stalks her beaches when the summer bakes and soars
and thorny devils track her dunes of blood.
Drifting down the Overflow, a long day from The Rock,
where dingoes croon in harmony and pea-green budgies flock,
where once the deadly hunting spears and boomerangs were hurled,
we know an Outback dreaming place; the heartland of our world.
There's romance in our Outback and the droving days gone by,
when cattlemen threw dices with their queen;
an eye upon the bullocks and another on the sky,
as poets penned us fancies of the scene.
We've traded broken brumbies for a mob of four-wheel-drives
and saddles for their lumbar-bracing seats;
we dream up Outback fantasies through workday nine-till-fives,
then act them out on weekend bush retreats.
Near the Never-Never land, above the treeless plain,
where courting brolgas two-step and our boxing kangas train;
away from pompous pageantry and flags of fuss unfurled,
you'll find an Outback dreaming place - a richly simple world.
She represents the freedom to be whom and what we please –
to come and go and worship as we will;
to cut through social barriers with nonchalance and ease;
to take a man on face and judge on skill.
But freedom carts a heavy load along each Outback lane
that wanders off to destines of beyond;
and they shall pay the penalty who treat her with disdain,
or place too much dependence on her bond.
Skirting buttes and mesas of a metal-bearing range,
where wedgetails surf on thermals while the cloud formations change,
where darkness brings nocturnals with their sleeping tails uncurled,
there is an Outback dreaming place, a wild and wondrous world.
She's Albert Namatjira's brush, a royally-raw domain;
a schooner 'sunk' where bushies' shoulders rub:
a singlet-wearing rouseabout whose language is profane,
and shouts around the Ettamogah Pub.
The Outback's in our psyche - she's our universal bride –
a part of us we need to love and share ….
and though we dwell in cities, still we boast of her with pride;
it's somehow reassuring that she's there.Around a smoking campfire as the evening yarns are told
and blackened billy chuckles while our blueys are unrolled,
where once the deadly hunting spears and boomerangs were hurled,
we love our Outback dreaming place - the centre of our world.
- © Max Merckenschlager
Pomberuk (Murray Bridge) S.A.
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