SEASONS OF FIRE
There is Law for Fire,
singing for Fire,
dancing for Fire ?
Fire Dreaming.
You have been there, you have seen it.
You know all the names of Fire:
signal fires, hunting fires,
sleeping fires, fires for light,
fires for cooking, for ceremonies,
healing fires of eucalyptus leaves ?
Fire is medicine, magic.
       Fire gave Crow a voice,
flying away in pain.
Fire brings old quarrels to an end.
On top of Uluru, do not drink
at the rockhole of Warnampi
unless you take Fire
or the snake will bite your spirit
and drought will follow.
Fire can protect you from the dead ones. 
You have been there, you have seen them.
You know all this Fire. 
The penis is Fire.
The vagina is Fire.
Fire is inside the bodies of animals.
The woman hands a firestick to the boy
and he becomes a man. 
There is a time for every fire.
The fires of January are different
from the fires of June.
In the cold time, a small nudge before sleep
will keep the flame alive all night.
The right ash, the right heat,
the right position of wind, dune and saltbush:
a technology of Fire. The knowledge. 
You have been there, you have watched.
You know all the seasons of Fire. 
        Hawk stopped Bush Turkey
throwing Fire into the sea.
Fire cannot be stolen now; it lives
everywhere ? inside the spinifex and dry wood.
All this is Law.
"The smoking days" ? Buyuguyunya ? come every year.
The air is full of smoke.
The smoke comes first, then the fire,
and then the smoke?
All this Law.
Hot is more than two sticks rubbed together; and
no chopping ? take only what you can drag:
green wood for shelter;
dead pieces for waru.
The wind from the mouth works kindling.
Fire makes grass seed.
It finds the kangaroo and chases him
to the hunters.
All this is Law.
The burning off and the gathering together are one. 
You have been there, you have seen it.
You know all the seasons of Fire.
SKY
The guardians of the circumcision ceremony
live in the constellation of Scorpio, and
turn the sky over every night.
The sky is a shell.
The Milky Way, a creek
of gleaming stones.
The Southern Cross is
the footprint of the wedge-tailed eagle,
and mushrooms are fallen stars.
The sun is a woman,
moving by different paths
between winter and summer.
And Jupiter, the dog,
hunts with Saturn, who brings
bush tucker back to Venus.
There are two moon men -
an old man and his son - who once
lived in the mountains;
the father is so large,
if you saw him, there would be 
no room for anything but fear.
The son persuades his father
to stay in camp. Some nights he stays
with him there.
If the father were allowed to rise
his light would blind the world.
And once, after the whitefellas came,
the people from wilarata side
saw Jesus in the clouds.
ICE
Yunakaltja,   salt lake -
camp of the ice-men, underneath.
You can?t see them, but that means nothing.
When they open the door to their cave
they can touch you.
(Who says they have no life?)
Everybody feels the ice-men.
They come from the south, travelling everywhere.
They make the cold.
They make the winter wind.
They can freeze anyone.
Their bodies are covered with ice.
Eyebrows, beards, long hair
thick with frost.
They freeze the rockholes.
They crack the hunters? feet,
lift mountains, and
turn the hills upside down.
They make small, big; and big, small.
Only strong chanting hunts them away -
you can?t fight ice with boomerang and spear.
But the songs can stop their roar;
the songs can chase them back to Yunakaltja,
to their home under the salt lake
where they live in ice
with no women.
INSTRUCTIONS FOR HONEY ANTS
Work with the end of your dress
tucked up   between your legs.
Speak in whispers;  laugh silently;
do not whistle.  Whistling, especially,
brings bad luck.   Do not be afraid
to feel where you cannot see.
Disappear into the earth 
with crowbar and billy can;
go down, maybe ten feet.
If you find them,  it is better
when children are waiting.
This is marangkatja: a gift.
Love what you are after.
SPIRIT CHILD
The spirit child has light skin
and long black hair.
It waits in the shade
of the bloodwood tree,
feeding on gum,    drinking
dew from the leaves.
It sleeps under loosened bark.
It lives in the hiding places
of secret/sacred objects,
and waits.   It looks after itself.
It watches from rockholes -
a little pebble:   no head,
no arms, no legs.
It keeps silent,   avoiding strangers.
It holds its breath.
It searches to be born,
to find the woman
with the kind face & large breasts -
to find nakedness.
The child chooses
its own mother.
WASH DAY
Monica and Victor come over to my place
to do their laundry
because there?s nothing at their place.
They show up on Sunday
with faded dresses, frayed shirts
and dusty blankets,
placing them with great care
into the squat, barrel-chested wringer
(the whites unsorted from the coloreds).
I put a country?n?western record on
while the clothes and blankets squish -
S?fump   S?fump   S?fump -
turning the water a dull red.
In the lounge room
Monica and Victor sit in green cane chairs
sipping tea and reading comics.
We speak very little to each other.
I don?t want to scare them away -
We are trying very hard.
Our relationship has grown,   so slowly
from nothing    to laundry.
RICHARD'S SONG
No meat  no rifle  no spear
can?t know em
store hungry
can?t buy em    no money
can?t steal em me
can?t grab em
can?t work em
can?t grip em   my kids
hand broke
workin tractor
can?t feed em
hungry     got angry
not lucky me
can?t fight em
one month
one bed
four wall