The big dry: 'See us, hear us, help us'
Farmers across New South Wales and Queensland are calling it the worst drought in living memory. Many are facing ruin and say it is time for their city cousins to acknowledge the disaster.
my country
i love a sunburnt country
a land of sweeping plains
of ragged mountain ranges
of drought and flooding rains
we all learnt this at school dorothea
we need flooding rain
about the poet dorothea mackellar
she wrote bush poetry
of the north west slopes and plains
her family had farms near here
dorothea
did you know
of dying cattle and sheep
of farmers committing suicide
of starving wallabies and roos
so desperate they lick the washing on the line
for a few drops of moisture
of a government who does nothing until it's too late
of a country which spends 4 billion dollars in foreign aid
but does not give free feed and water to its own farmers
in crisis
of city folk
of smashed avocado on toast and lattes
filling their in ground swimming pools
who will realise when the supermarket shelves are empty
that
food does not drop like manna from heaven
it is grown on farms
Bev Hicks
"It's just relentless, you don't sleep because you can't stop thinking about it," she says.
I'd really like people in the city to remember us, see us, hear us, know that we're still here.
It's important to look after your own."
Lifeline: 13 11 14
Midweek Motif - Poets United
This is awful, and so eye-opening. Thank you for writing this.
ReplyDeleteThis is my favorite part:
"of smashed avocado on toast and lattes
filling their in ground swimming pools" ... because a meal like that and a dip in the pool sound like heaven, which is your entire point; ultimately, it's so easy to focus on what we want for ourselves, our own bellies, and forget about everyone else
Honestly, I think it's easier to understand thirst than hunger. I've never really had to go without food. But I have gone without water at times, when working on a roof or being out on some rare occasion when the sun was unbearable and my whole mouth was dead-dry ... This I can at least somewhat relate to.
Suicide to put an end to facing thirst, and the inability to provide for loved ones, human and animal --- this is really devastating.
Thank you for your sincere kind comment. I am up here at the moment and it is heartbreaking to see the land like this.
ReplyDeleteCity folks have a way of thinking that food comes in packages, not from trees or the earth. In drought country, especially, they are about to get a big surprise.
ReplyDelete"food does not drop like manna from heaven
ReplyDeleteit is grown on farms' Tell it, Rall! Thank you for the focus, for the poet, new to me, for the urgency. Poetry can bring the background into the foreground, make us widen our vision.
"of dying cattle and sheep
ReplyDeleteof farmers committing suicide"...OMG...This is the story of my country. Is it happening there also? In your land?
Yes.It is at crisis point.
DeleteMore to come....
ReplyDeleteYes...we are still in winter and it has been Spring weather for the last 2 months.
DeleteI see that cracked parched earth and can imagine the desperate thirst and hunger of the animals, the hard work of the farmers. I am sadly all too aware of the blind disregard of the governments to this reality. Thanks for a poem that opens eyes and minds to this struggle. And each year gets hotter.
ReplyDeleteIn Caledon, Ontario, there is a patch of land, which shows the destructive impact that humanity is having on the world. We call it, "The Caledon Badlands". Due to the drier and hotter summer, in most of Canada, we are experiencing uncontrollable forest and grass fires. As crops fail from lack of rain.
ReplyDeleteA true witness. Evocative and heartrending. Seems farmers the world over get the shaft. Ironic that we urban and suburban dwellers ignore the well-being of the practioners that literally put food on our table.
ReplyDeleteI saw a "video" flash thing waiting on my Canadian weather network station on the net - BUT didn't have the heart to even click on it and watch - because the image was of a silver sleek Big Rig water tanker being surrounded, almost overrun by god only knows how many black cattle (it was an overhead view) .... and I was like Holy Hell. Holy Hell. The image was so frank, so cruel for the seeing - I can't even imagine what the video was like, but I just can't handle one more bloody story/image about how the world is literally burning to a crisp (for heat or wildfires or whatever crazy deadly combo) and/or flooding to literally sweep it all away.
ReplyDeleteThis is a world gone completely mad. And it just makes me want to open my mouth and scream beyond bloody murder (Edvard Munch's The Scream is a tip of an iceberg idea) for the absolute stupidity and ignorance of governments and far too many people, generally. Food, as you've noted, does not fall from the sky. Insta everything today. And this is how we obliterate ourselves. Christ, I so ache for those animals. And their keepers/minders.
Sadly this drought has been coming and as you say the Federal government will do nothing until it is too late. Luckily South Australia is less affected as a little rain has fallen recently which should provide some feed for the stock. Australia is the "Lucky country" if it rains!
ReplyDeletePoetry is good for misery and this is stark and sharp, straight to the conscience.
ReplyDelete