Author’s note: Due to colonisation and the effect the White Australia policy had on my people, I did not grow up with these stories given in physical form. My story has been revealed to me slowly through Dreams and visions, which in my culture is a form of how songs and stories are passed down via the other realm.
Part one
In giant rock formations
Strata
Cliff face
Rocks that seem to hang from the sky
Watching us
Through the portal of timeless bush
Desert
Ocean
And waterhole
Old medicine man teaches young boy
Old medicine woman teaches jikurr girl
I’ll pull from your body what makes you sick
I’ll pull from your mind what makes you cluttered
No Pharmacy needed here
Twigs and hair and creepy crawlies too
All these things I’ll pull from you
It’s the Lore passed down through dreams
No certificates for nursing here
Bush doctor
Bush medicine
Sees your sickness through their eyes
Feels your sickness through their touch
Eucalyptus leaves thrust on live embers
Smoke rise
Lift the darkness
Invite the peace of mind
No drugs needed here
It’s the law of the Earth
Lore of the Serpent
Who dreams through us
Heals through us
No bulk billing needed here
Driving through the inlands
Song in language comes to me
I sing
Think of the deep blue sea
Feel the heart of a whale
I sing
To feel the deep blue sea
Healing my heart
No alcohol needed here
On giant rock formations I go
To feel the heart of
Red-Tailed
Black Cockatoo
Old Medicine man
Old medicine woman
Finds twigs and hair
Creepy crawlies too
Bush doctor
Bush Medicine
Will pull the sickness from you
Part 2
The theme is the colour green
A grasshopper
And teeth
Teeth I tread on like stepping stones
They begin as sturdy
And white
Then grow black moss like decay
Devil Grasshopper
MONSTER in its dungeon
Man eater
Keeps a secret underground
In the cove
“Don’t open that trap door – forbidden information there”
Green stone with x-ray-like teeth
I dream of them
Re-occurring in sleep
A new one begins to grow in the bottom row
Deep below where the wisdom one was
Rugged edged. Spikey.
“You have 50 months
Of this to endure
You’ll crumble
Debilitate
For 50 months
Then it will stop
You’ll feel yourself again
But the second lot of teeth will come
The excruciating bottom row
Decay and rot
They’ll crush the other teeth
Push them from their homes
From safe and sound
To falling out
The teeth will come back
And pain lunge into you
Like a WAR BOOMERANG
You’ll fall
You’ll suffer
In the sheets of agony
You’ll be covered
And finally
It will stop
You’ll be good and strong
Tall and calm
And as hard as Iron Bark”
I wake up early morning
From this dream
Both sides of my mouth hurting now
And I find
a new tooth
Growing deep below
Where my old wisdom one was
Pushing through gums
Tender and bruised
Green Stone
Devil Grasshopper
And teeth that are new
Part 3
Patience in the gift of Dreaming
Songline
I return home
And Dreams settle
I awake one morning
The teeth have disappeared
“Then it will stop
You’ll feel yourself again
But the second lot of teeth will come”
Part 4
They fly from the North
Come to dance and sing
The locals look after them
Red-Tailed Black Cockatoo
Flies from the Gulf
To the South
To Sing and Dance on foreign Country
The owners look after them
The Song and Melodies
Like ancient birth-right
Echo in my heart
My Blood-Rite
Echoes in eternity
Cover image by russellstreet, via Flickr
About the author
Jack Sheppard is of the Kurtjar clan of the Gulf of Carpentaria, North QLD. He is an artist driven by his culture, spirituality, and humanity. Jack studied at Naisda Dance College and WAAPA’s Aboriginal Theatre Course. He works and creates in the artistic elements of movement, circus, theatre and physical theatre. Jack has written one short play, ‘Monsson’, has had his poetry published in Rabbit Poetry Magazine – The Indigenous Issue, and The Australian Poetry Journal.