Judith Wright (1915-2000) is one of Australia's best known and loved poets. I was introduced to Judith not through her poetry, although I have since enjoyed some of it (see below), but rather through her 1959 Australian classic The Generations of Men (Oxford University Press, Melbourne, Australia). Far from a book only "about" men, Wright recounts the life and trials of her pioneering grandparents: Albert Andrew Wright and Charlotte May Mackenzie. Both born in the Hunter Valley of New South Wales in the mid-19th century, Albert and May spent a rocky two decades trying to tame the harsh wilderness of south Queensland. Fighting extreme droughts, rare but tragic floods, and the daily heat and disease to cattle and family that came with life on the Tropic of Capricorn in the 19th century. This book was recommended to me by my new colleague in Newcastle, NSW, John Burrows. John read my earlier write up of Mary Durak's Kings in Grass Castles and emailed me: "Anyone who liked Durak's classic must read Wright's book." I agree totally. Wright is a gifted writer and I found myself flipping page after page of this small book and then feeling sad as I neared the end. The heroine of the story is May, Judith's grandmother, as she keeps her land and ranch after Albert's early death despite the chorus of opinions to do otherwise. An especially touching part of the book comes just before Albert's death. He finds himself on one of the few if not the first "holiday" (Aussi-speak for vacation) that he allowed. Here Albert takes stock of his life (which was to end before the trip ended) and considers his life of toil.

"What was so important to them (the drovers and early settlers) -- what drove them, single-minded, panting in greed and eagerness, while their lives vanished in the labour? Would his sons, too, be driven in this whirlwind of destruction, and wake perhaps, as he was doing, to ask in the end what had consumed their lives? Money, security, prosperity -- those three words had led him on as they led the others, clawing at his very sleep. They had built the cities that had grown so much larger and noiser during his lifetime: on his visits to such places, he felt nowadays discomforted and uneasy. Doubtless they would build cities larger still." (p161)

Like Albert, this reader ponders Wright's insightful question: what consumes our lives?

Judith grew up in northern New South Wales in the area known as the New England tablelands. Being from a 'New England' myself (NorthEast USA), I naturally resonated with some of her poems that speak of her youth and the birds and land that she loved. Here are two selected poems by Judith Wright from her work Birds -- poems by Judith Wright (National Library of Australia, Canberra, ACT, 2003).

The Blue Wrens and the Butcher-bird
Sweet and small the blue wren
whistles to his gentle hen,
"The creek is full, the day is gold,
the tale of love is never told.
Fear not, my love, nor fly away,
for safe, safe in the blackthorn-tree
we shall build our nest today.
Trust to me, oh trust to me."

Cobwebs they gather and dry grass,
greeting each other as they pass
up to the nest and down again,
the blue wren and the brown wren.
They seek and carry far and near,
down the bank and up the hill,
until that crystal note they hear
that strikes them dumb and holds them still.

Great glorious passion of a voice--
sure all that hear it must rejoice.
But in the thorn-bush silent hide
the nest-builders side by side.
"The blue-wren's nestlings and his wife,
and he himself, that sprig of blue,
I shall kill, and hang them safe--
the blackthorn spears shall run them through."

Still and still the blue wren
sits beside his cowering hen.
There they wait like stone by stone
until the butcher-bird is gone.
Then soft and sweet the blue wren
twitters to his anxious hen,
"Trust to me, oh trust to me;
I know another blackthorn-tree."

Peacock
Shame on the aldermen who locked
the Peacock in a dirty cage!
His blue and copper sheens are mocked
by habit, hopelessness and age.

The weary Sunday families
along their gravelled paths repeat
the pattern of monotonies
that he treads out with restless feet.

And yet the Peacock shines alone;
and if one metal feather fall
another grows where that was grown.
Love clothes him still, in spite of all.

How pure the hidden spring must rise
that time and custon cannot stain!
It speaks its joy again--again.
Perhaps the aldermen are wise.