Assimilation / Western Desert / 1962-1974

Assimilation / Western Desert / 1962-1974
I

On the first night
all the people buried their tins of meat;
it was the wrong color - it’d been dead
too long.

On the second night
- more tins.     A few crazy people
swallowed the meat.  They were hungry,
and the whitefella smiled.

Third night
the crazy people were still alive
so everyone started lining up
for meat - a single file.

Fourth night
a whitefella showed all those ladies
and men the key
on the bottom of the tin.

On the fifth night
all the people were opening their own.

On the sixth night
Titus took Matthew’s meat
by accident - and had his head
split open in a fight.
 
 

II

Tjakamarra says:
 “Before camp pie and shoes,
before motor car and Jesus,
before missionary and baby money,
before mining company and police,
before rifle and English,
before guitar,
before card games,

before the Queen,
before pens, pencils and comic books,
before movies and rock and roll,
before blankets, before grog,
cigarettes, pills, bandages, baked beans,
telephones, chicken, and soap;
before doors and scissors,
crowbars and tooth doctors. . .
we ate kampurarrpa berries and kangaroo,
bush turkey, taakurtutu, witchetty grub and yiparlu.
Yipilypa!   Happy!   Never yawning before the hunt,
we dug cooking holes in the sand,
 sitting back on our heels
while our spirits stood straight up in our bodies.

Now, all our names are written down in books,
and flour keeps the people, and tea and sugar
keep the people,    and

everyone is living close to clothes.”
 
 

III

This boy learned how to read
This boy learned how to write
This girl learned how to add
This person learned how to speak
This child learned how to count
This boy says ABCs up to “Q”
This child eats pencils - no breakfast
This girl says “yessir” / says “no sir”
This one lost her book
This boy is 75%
This child erases

These people have a word for this,
           one word;
translated, it means:
          “Oh me! How my spirit grows short!”