"Blood Stained Hills" by Ali Cobby Eckermann

And we forage here on these blood stained hills
Hills that roll smooth and treeless with truth
As a warmth arrives on the Ancestral wind
Mouthing memories of their blood and mine
I carry the prized digging stick of my grandmother
Her handprint and my handprint combined
A promise of happiness I followed her here
Incarnate by history and this new child inside

And we forage here on these blood stained hills
Searching for the bird sounds that she had heard
To locate the songline she once had walked
The handheld wooden stick our compass of hope
Day and night meld and we are never alone
As the wind whispers nouns we had not heard
As we resuscitate these names into life forms
The blood stained hills reveal the pathway

Every hill is a life soul that has given its blood
We forage to nurture the knowledge of land
Scattered by winds from the heavens above
And a slow gentle wind unveils the songline
A sudden rush of birdsong leads us to water
And the old wooden stick vibrates in my hand
We crouch to drink and crouch to birth
Soon we will separate from one to another

The blood of birth is the blood that unites us
This daughter is my grandmother and I am the hills
Nourished by the eternal winds and the words
The songline sung into our eyes and our souls
And the songs warn of happiness and harm
As I hold my daughter close to my chest
In these rolling hills is the desire for content
The stain of mining is the new born threat

So swiftly the present can become the past
As water turns to drought and the singing birds flee
The digging stick has turned serpent and slid away
Her handprint replaced to thrive in my heart
And the wind whips and wails with its love for us
And as the songline subsides back to the earth
Like the blood of death and the blood of birth
We remain to forage on these blood stained hills