Artists

Artists

The tools of their art are spread on the ground:
the ochres, the reeds chewed to a brushpoint,
the grinding stones - only the glue they use
to bind the colour concedes the century.
On their bark sheets the ancient lore
glows in bright new lines; the Mimi people
gaze back cryptic and potent; the creatures
of the land leap and glide in x-ray
on the fine cross-hatching of ochre and white...

And what do they mean? The artists cannot say:
their sources are postcards, picture books
of someone else's Dreaming, from tribes
across the continent or now dispersed -
dutifully they copy the mysteries
to which they hold no key. Here is art
without knowledge, beauty without meaning:
time and change have reft them of knowledge,
and severed the dreamers from their dreams.