My People

by Oodgeroo

my people Oodgeroo’s writing has a unique place in Australian literature. When her poetry was first published in the 1960s, Kath Walker, as she was known then, provided a brave new voice for marginalised Aboriginal Australians. For the first time, an Aboriginal Australian was analysing and judging white Australians as well as her own people. She often made provocative and passionate pleas for We want hope, not racialism,
Brotherhood, not ostracism,
Black advance, not white
Make us equals, not dependants. This collection of poetry and prose is a reminder of Oodgeroo’s contribution to Indigenous culture and the journey toward reconciliation. All Australians should be proud of this poet who dedicated her life to her people and her land.

Genres: Poetry, Australia, Indigenous, Nonfiction

144 pages, Paperback

Published November 17, 2020

Reviews

[Max D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ignore this review it's essentially going to be a long list of my favourite poems from the collection for future reference:

*The curlew cried.
*Tree Grave.
*Last of his tribe.
*Corroboree
*Assimilation - no! --"Pour your pitcher of wine into the wide river and where is your wine? / There is only the river."
*The food gatherers -- "Even the small bronze chickowee /That gossips in bright melody –/Look, into the clump he's gone, /He has a little murder on! /For food is life and life is still /The old carnage, and all must kill"
*Gifts -- (this is how those stupid sappy romance monologues feel sometimes.)
*Municipal Gum
*Tribal justice -- (I like a whole short narrative in poem form.)
*Namatjira
*Understand, Old One
*Gooboora, the silent pool
*Cookalingee
*United we win
*Verses
*Civilisation
*Freedom
*Return to Nature
*Daisy Bindi
*Oh, Trugganner!

Reading her biography at the end was quite powerful, as well. I'm glad it was included. I quite liked the voice behind the poems, it seemed to swing regularly between emotional and sardonic. The second half of the collection spoke to me a bit more than the first, but I'd have to go through with more a fine-tooth comb to work out why.

[Anchal Bhatia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oodgeroo has a talent of using very few words to paint extremely descriptive and informative scenarios. An excellent way to become intrigued of the history of the Aboriginal people in Australia and motivation to learn more.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oodgeroo Noonuccal (1920 - 1993) was born on Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island) in Queensland to parents Edward Ruska, a Quandamooka man from the Noonuccal Clan from the Moreton Bay area and Stradbroke Island; and Lucy, from the Peewee clan from inland Australia.  They named her Kathleen Jean Mary Ruska, and for many years she was known to Australians as the first published Aboriginal poet under her married name Kath Walker.  In 1988 she changed her name to Oodgeroo (meaning 'paperbark tree') Noonuccal.

She could only access a rudimentary education and went into domestic service but enlisted in the Australian Women’s Army Service (AWAS) after her two brothers were captured by the Japanese in the Fall of Singapore.  She was one of the Aboriginal officers that was featured in the DVA Indigenous Service curriculum unit that I used to teach my Year 5 and 6 students, and her photo is on the front cover of the DVA booklet (2nd from left at the top).

She emerged as an activist during the 1960s and her best-selling first book We Are Going (1964), was the first book to be published by an Aboriginal woman.  She used her poetry to convey her pride in her Aboriginality, her desire for equality and to advocate for change.  As Mairi Neil notes in her review of this collection, the tone of the poems changes as the pages progress.  The optimism of an inclusive approach towards reconciliation can be seen in the first poems:

'All One Race'

Black tribe, yellow tribe, red, white or brown,
From where the sun jumps up to where it goes down,
Herrs and pukka-sahibs, demoiselles and squaws,
All one family, so why make wars?
[...]
I'm for all humankind, not colour gibes;
I’m international, and never mind tribes.(p.1)

In 'Let Us Not Be Bitter' she acknowledges that her people must try to understand the white man's ways/And accept them as they accept us

Away with bitterness, my own dark people
Come stand with me, look forward, not back,
For a new time has come for us,
Now we must change, my people. For so long
Time for us stood still; now we know
Life is change, life is progress,
Life is learning things, life is onward.
White men had to learn civilised ways,
Now it is our turn… (p2)

The past is gone, she writes, and The future comes like dawn after the dark/bringing fulfilment. 

In 'Stone Age', she reminds White man, only time is between us because once in the time long gone you lived in caves and thought that lightning was magic.

We are the last of the Stone Age tribes,
Waiting for time to help us
As time helped you. (p.21)

In 'An Appeal' she urges statesmen, writers, unions, churches and the press — the most powerful of all —

Right us a wrong and break the thrall
That keeps us low.  (p.3)

But after these exhortations, comes a lament for the women and girls exploited by low-grade animals while the white community washes their hand of it like Pilate.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2025/01/28/m...

[David Burns · Rating 4 out of 5]

I will bring you love, said the young lover,

A glad light to dance in your dark eye.

Pendants I will bring of the white bone,

And gay parrot feathers to deck your hair.

But she only shook her head.

I will put a child in your arms, he said,

Will be a great headman, great rain-maker.

I will make remembered songs about you

That all the tribes in all the wandering camps

Will sing for ever.

But she was not impressed.

I will bring you the still moonlight on the lagoon,

And steal for you the singing of all the birds;

I will bring down the stars of heaven to you,

And put the bright rainbow into your hand.

No, she said, bring me tree-grubs.

"GIFTS" by Noonuccal Oodgeroo

My People ** Bought in a book store in Melbourne and read in Melbourne, along the Great Ocean Road, and Hobart, Australia (Dec 2023 - Jan 2024)

[Becky Salomons · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every single one of these poems are filled with depth, truth and great perspective. I loved there rawness and realness - I thought and felt very deeply the whole time was I was reading these poems. Many of the poems will hit you across the face like a bucket of cold water! it will be intense but it will wake you the hell up. Some people might struggle with some of the unpolished edges but for me personally this was one of the elements in Oodgeroo’s poetry I loved the most. It was refreshing to hear a voice with such a degree of views (happy and sad and many more in between) showing many sides of the coin but giving a much needed window in to the oldest culture on earth - a must read for all Australians.

[Kate Larsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A powerful collection of lyrical and political First Nations poetry, with clear calls for action and justice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people from the 1970s that are as relevant (and depressingly similar) to today’s.

“We want hope, not racialism,
Brotherhood, not ostracism,
Black advance, not white ascendance:
Make us equals, not dependants.”

[Michelle Buddhi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poems of love, loss, colonialism, resilience, heart break, love of Country, kinship, culture, truth... It’s a no brainer that Oodgeroo’s work should be taught in schools. I can’t believe we still don’t get the young ones on these books. Grateful to read a gem like this!

[Katharine Smth · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book so much, I am actually so serious! It's actually so good and interesting especially because it's indigenous australian literature. My favourite school book ever. Like Outsiders doesnt even compare!!!

[Kindredcrafters · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovely book.

[Elizabeth]

Really moving poems, I loved so many, including:

Community rain song
No more boomerang
Corroboree
Gooboora
Cookalingee
Verses
Time is running out

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

"All things wild and tameless,
Hunted down and hated,
Something in my wild heart
With your own is mated."

[Rosa Frei · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful and moving.

[Courtney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovely use of language, of rhythm and story telling. Still relevant today.