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Toyota Dreaming

At sunrise, the mine lifts in stark surprise reveals a
skyline shaped by giant graders Kimberley hiUs
stepped like ancient ziggurats

Machines that sifted precious ore are silent now. Giant
loaders have left the tailings heaped in piles: pink
dust powders the sky

Young Gidja men speed in new cars, scatter the
tribes with ideas of progress. ew stories
cut deep, cover the tracks of the ancestors

Fumes from Toyota utes spread particles
of doubt among the people. A new smell fills the
air. Black roads smooth a bumpy ride

*

The old ones do not understand this need to
change. Re-create the ancient stories for the
sake of a diamond mine

They sing the garranggami Dreaming
Point to rocks. Three women turned to stone warn of
the sacred Barramundi’ journey

– dance the legend shaped by a magic fish
who leaps the narrow gorge: brushing her pink and
golden scales on her way upstream

Women ‘Smoke’ the bosses crowding onto
totem ground. Men who come from far away burrow
like ants beneath the secret places

*

Argyle have come to build a tunnel, excavate the
hollow caves, searching for hidden seams Their
hope studded with diamonds

– plan to blast the Gap, fill the sacred springs with
broken rock, drive the workers
into a pit, offering danger money

The tribes can see the value, the power
in red shale: they sift their Country’s losses against solid
gains. Working for ‘The Company’

lured by the shine of a crystal trinket harder than
stone. Buried treasure of the River Spirit gleams forever
in the white man’s dreams.