01-30-2017, 07:19 AM
The edit has really delivered and clarified the content with a much stronger opening and close, the internal sonics ring out as before and the attention to meter makes it a delight to read out loud. The historical content keeps it grounded, on my first read when I saw the title I though this was about ghosts in black saturday bushfires, calling for the past to be remembered and the new opening for me nods towards this. Clearly Saturday is a warrior and a leader, I think you need S5 to bring home the new ending. The poem is a delight to read. Some comment below hopefully appropriate to a 2nd edit.
Edit 2 29/1/17
This white page tells black stories A great opening can be read on quite a few levels
in neat paragraphs; appendices
to place name meanings, monument
inscriptions, paintings, bones. bones really sets the tone here and moves the reader into S2 with an element of foreboding
The circle of stones
is scattered with sheep dung
leading to the sheds where
shears became blades
for the throats of children. this is a really powerful stanza, I was a visitor walking around old ruins sensing the history trapped inside the building
At Morriset's table,
grace was the screams
of Saturday's people: the void between white and black in such simple three lines, just super.
Wiradjuri we, born free
to die as you please. You
spread your disease, you rape
and you maim, you plunder
and poison and pass us the blame.
Windradyne raised his spears and his men
took war to the new white homes, and sang:
you couldn't find us, you who are blind,
you killed our women and children instead.
You made a sport of Wiradjuri murder,
baited our hungry, slaughtered our young,
buried it all in a mountain of lies.
In the preceding two stanzas there is a graphical message that should probably merge into one that works without losing or changing the end stanza but you know best it depends how important the songs are to the piece.
Cudgegong cries
as Wiradjuri die
and Windradyne yields
so the ploughing of fields
can continue 'til all
the corpses have gone super ending nothing to change
Edit 2 29/1/17
This white page tells black stories A great opening can be read on quite a few levels
in neat paragraphs; appendices
to place name meanings, monument
inscriptions, paintings, bones. bones really sets the tone here and moves the reader into S2 with an element of foreboding
The circle of stones
is scattered with sheep dung
leading to the sheds where
shears became blades
for the throats of children. this is a really powerful stanza, I was a visitor walking around old ruins sensing the history trapped inside the building
At Morriset's table,
grace was the screams
of Saturday's people: the void between white and black in such simple three lines, just super.
Wiradjuri we, born free
to die as you please. You
spread your disease, you rape
and you maim, you plunder
and poison and pass us the blame.
Windradyne raised his spears and his men
took war to the new white homes, and sang:
you couldn't find us, you who are blind,
you killed our women and children instead.
You made a sport of Wiradjuri murder,
baited our hungry, slaughtered our young,
buried it all in a mountain of lies.
In the preceding two stanzas there is a graphical message that should probably merge into one that works without losing or changing the end stanza but you know best it depends how important the songs are to the piece.
Cudgegong cries
as Wiradjuri die
and Windradyne yields
so the ploughing of fields
can continue 'til all
the corpses have gone super ending nothing to change
If your undies fer you've been smoking through em, don't peg em out