We Are Going

by Oodgeroo Noonuccal

They came into the little town

A semi-naked band subdued and silent

All that remained of their tribe.

They came here to the place of their old bora ground

Where now the many white men hurry about like ants.

Notice of the estate agent reads: ‘Rubbish May Be Tipped Here’.

Now it half covers the traces of the old bora ring.

‘We are as strangers here now, but the white tribe are the strangers.

We belong here, we are of the old ways.

We are of the corroboree and the bora ground,

We are the old ceremonies, the laws of the elders.

We are the wonder tales of Dream Time, the tribal elders told.

We are the past, the hunts and the laughing games, the wandering camp fires.

We are the lightening bolt over Gaphemba Hill

Quick and terrible,

And the Thunderer after him, that loud fellow.

We are shadow ghosts creeping back as the camp fires burn low.

We are nature and the past, all the old ways

Gone now and scattered.

The scrubs are gone, the hunting and the laughter.

The eagle is gone, the emu and the kangaroo are gone from this place.

The bora ring is gone.

The corroboree is gone.

And we are going.’