The Word Because or How It

backdrops isn’t exactly what that Elder ever 
claimed to love,
                                 but the wanting at the heart of

every want, this seeing
the Dreamtime flow, change course, drought up, stop at 
who-damned-the-river.
                                               Oh crucial

terrifying eternal spots blotted out where 
the winding water now
hits land out of reach where women 
gave birth for so long,
daughters and sons come to the world
in the blessed shade of impeccable certain trees 
marked sacred for passage in the Dreaming.

The Outback. I hear it again: Blood
all over the earth out there. That was the Indigenous artist 
in Canberra as she walked in black leather to
—was it a Harley?—and stood
                                                          in winter sun like an axis.

Read more from Issue 18.1.