The Ochre Track of My Dreaming

I visited the Simpson’s Gap which is 5 minutes from where I am staying. It was unbelievably inspiring. I cried as I took in this monolithic vision. I have travelled the world but never seen sights like this. I felt to write a poem to try and find the words, as I was speechless on confronting such beauty.

Here is a brief outline by Wikipedia.

Located in the West MacDonnell National Park, Simpsons Gap is one of the more well known gaps in the West MacDonnell Range, being only 26 km west of Alice Springs.

The Arrernte Aboriginal name for Simpsons Gap is Rungutjirpa, being the mythological home of a group of giant goanna ancestors…

Easily accessed, the Simpsons Gap area includes large areas of Mulga, as well as a stronghold for over 40 rare and relict plants. It is also an area that has important spiritual meaning for the Arrernte Aboriginal people, being where several dreaming trails and stories cross…

Simpsons Gap is also a unique gorge that is home to a number of species of arid land frogs. During the right conditions, as seen during the first couple of months in 2010, locals and visitors were thrilled to witness thousands of frogs ranging from the Desert Tree Frog, Spencer’s Burrowing Frog, Main’s Frog (also known as the Sheep Frog) and the Centralian Green Frog. During such unique wildlife activity, the Parks and Wildlife Service of the NT put on special walks and night time tours to take in these events.

THE OCHRE TRACK OF DREAMING

The oche track of my life,
Found Simpson’s gap,
My heart yearns for the indigenous tongue,
To whisper the word that calls the land home,
But no thought comes to mind,
As a sign of ancient voices.

The caterpillar dreaming,
Is the Australian silk route,
That weaves the spine of ranges,
For this is before East and West,
This is ancient beyond the range of MacDonnell,
And I have no name for such a sacred place,
I can only yield to the grandeur,
That dwarfs my humanity.

There was a dreamless state,
When the caterpillar arose from the sea,
Shaping the world we see,
The great shape changer,
Of mystical creed and nature,
That is only known in the crystal realization
of my tears.

The waterfalls of the interior,
Dispel droughts of dis-belief,
A relief forming my great sandy desert of shifting sands
Beneath my feet,
As humility leaves no track,
As the winds of reality shape change and sculpture the inner landscape,
From forces garnered beyond space and time,
To grace my healing,
For the healing of grace is holy land,
For all land is holy,
For I am kneeling before creation in every direction.

I see no meaning or sacred dreaming in the Simpson’s,
Or Simpson and his donkey,
Carrying wounded reminders of wars without feeling,
Celebrated as heroism,
That never know the art of freedom lives outside closed doors,
As windows open to illumination,
Enlightening geometric symbols of a painted desert,
Found in the caves of primordial man,
Who forgot the reasons,
As he sat in the sand under the tree,
Of his greater being.

I see two mountains sleeping on their sides,
Layering evidence of time as a red crescent,
Jaggered with geological imprints,
Ecological footprints of dinosaurs,
Stampeding evolution,
Serving as blueprints of tumultuous earth upheaval,
Arising from the centre of the earth,
A heart centre,
Some call Uluru.

Humans ascend to greet the great spirit,
In dreams without wings,
In stories without sound,
Salt lakes spot the dreaming,
Each day blossoming a blessing
granting renewed life,
For nature is the mother and the father,
The masculine and the feminine as one,
Opposites yet compliments,
And all children are nestled into its folds,
Protected and safe,
For where one starts the other finishes,
Where one finishes the other starts,
As a carpet weaving many stories,
Into the mosaic of an unfolding greater life,
That only a silk worm can weave,
For the dreaming of magic weaves our hearts
as the rhythm and rhyme of life’s fabric,
A flute beckoning the magical life,
Where you choose what you see,
And you see what you believe,
For to breathe is miraculous,
As time the metronome
of your beating drum.

Each day delivers a new song line,
Anchors the energy grid,
For the caterpillar bridges all gaps and synapse,
Allowing rivers of understanding to continually flow
around ghost gums,
So that we all grow and drum,
As dream weavers together,
In the harmony
The sweet honey
Of peace.

 
Mohandas Gandhi

“An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.”

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