Desert Patterns

By Colleen Keating

When we listen, this land sings to us, holds us, nurtures us. This land is the common ground that we share. This small blue planet is the common world of our existence. Desert Patterns is a collection of poetry that touches the membrane between two worlds with the breath of wildness and our inland journeys. In its striking imagery, we h

• Language: English
• Publisher: Debbie Lee
• Release date: Jan 30, 2020
• ISBN: 9781760418458

Colleen Keating

Following on the publication of her award-winning poetry collection Fire on Water in 2017, Colleen Keating, a Sydney poet, has continued to search for a sense of place in country - a land that is timeless and always changing. Much country has been handed back to its traditional owners, while mining companies and pastoralists continue to maintain their position. Aboriginal art has flourished and more people are searching for a place to call home. Colleen has also had published by Ginninderra Press A Call to Listen and a highly acclaimed verse novel, Hildegard of Bingen: A poetic journey. She has also co-authored Landscapes of the Heart (Picaro Poets) with John Egan.

Book preview

Desert Patterns

Desert Patterns

Colleen Keating

Ginninderra Press

Desert Patterns

ISBN 978 1 76041 845 8

Copyright © text Colleen Keating 2020

Cover photo by Praewthida K on Unsplash

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All rights reserved. No part of this ebook may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the copyright holder. Requests for permission should be sent to the publisher at the address below.

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First published 2020 by

Ginninderra Press

PO Box 3461 Port Adelaide 5015 Australia

www.ginninderrapress.com.au

To our grandchildren, Lachlan, Thomas, Tyler, Jacinta, Cameron, Edison, Dominic, Eleanor, Gemma, Darcy and Ethan and their burgeoning love for this country.

Contents

Introduction

The Top End of Australia

Walking Larapinta Trail

Journey to Kati Thanda – Lake Eyre

Memorial

Acknowledgements

Also by Colleen Keating and published by Ginninderra Press

There is a desert I long to be walking,

a wide emptiness:

Peace beyond any understanding of it.

Rumi

Introduction

Australians are becoming more coastal dwellers. We sit on this veranda, enjoy the coastal breeze. To venture too far into wilderness is a challenge. Even in the city, it is easy to become impatient with nature, for it follows its own laws. Trees drop leaves and branches, their roots wreck paths. Animals eat our plants (my ringtail possums love my parsley), cockatoos eat solar wires, brush turkeys renovate gardens. As for the bandicoots and echidnas that lived in our garden, they have left long ago. Even the blue-tongue lizards are rare now.

Thomas Berry, environmentalist and eco-theologian, writes, ‘this generation has lost interaction with nature, we are talking to ourselves’.

We need to talk to the rivers, deserts, mountains, forests and grasslands. Walk in their way, listen to what they have to say, begin a new conversation and become intimate again with the natural world.

Such experiences bring us closer

to the heart of our land,

to the spirit of country,

to the soul of what it means to be a human being.

When we listen, this land sings to us, holds us, nurtures us. This land is the common ground that we share. This small blue planet is the common world of our existence.

Desert Patterns is a collection of poetry that touches the mem- brane between