HALF-CASTE GIRL

 

          HALF-CASTE GIRL

            “Half-caste Girl” is a poem written by Judith Wright who was an Australian poet, environmentalist and campaigner for Aboriginal land rights.

            She was born on 31 May 1925 at Armidale in Australia, and died on 25 June 2000 at Canberra in the same country.

            She is known as ‘the conscience of the nation’ for her commitment to environmental problems and  the movement of Aboriginal land rights.

            However, she is better remembered as a poet who  helped Australia  r her specific identity as a country.

            The Aboriginal land rights movement in Australia was an effort to regain control of traditional lands and resources for Aboriginal peoples who had been dispossessed of their ancestral territories.  Judith Wright played an important role in this movement.

            A half-caste girl means one whose parents are of different races.

            In her poem “Half-caste Girl”which is given below,  Judith Wright explores themes of people’s  identity, their heritage, and the complexities of mixed races.

            The central theme of the poem under reference is the experience of a girl of mixed ancestry.

            Here is the full text of the poem:

 

Little Josie buried under the bright moon

is tired of being dead, death lasts too long.

She would like to push death aside, and stand on the hill

and beat with a waddy on the bright moon like a gong

across the hills, the hills that belong to no people

and so to none are foreign,

Once she climbed high to find the native cherry;

the lithe dark hearted lubra

who in her beads like blood

dressed delicately for love -

moves her long hands among the strings of the wind,

singing the songs of women,

the songs of love and dying.

 

Against the world’s stone walls she thrusts her heart.

Endless the strength of its beating –

atom of flesh that cannot move a stone.

She used her love for lever;

but the wall is cunningly made.

Not even the strong break jail.

So she is restless still under her root warm cover,

hearing the noise of living,

forgetting the pain of dying.

 

Little Josie buried under the bright sun

would like to open her eyes and dance in the light.

Who is it had covered the sun and the beautiful moon

with a wallaby skin, and left her alone in the night?

                             ********

G.R.Kanwal

19 May 2025