Introduction
In the late 1970s, K A Nelson lived and worked in the remote Enga Province of Papua New Guinea. Her homes were near the Lagaip and Ambum Rivers, where casuarinas grew in profusion. Nelson’s attention was drawn to the different sounds casuarinas made in different weather and circumstances. She sometimes sat on her verandah listening to the lilt of a song casuarinas made with the valley breeze or with the rush of the river after rain; in the company of birdsong, it was different again. She has listened closely to their orchestral brilliance ever since.
Art of the She-Oak
I hum lullabies in the thinness of air; the wisp
of a breeze inspires my songs,
songs that I sing with She-Oak aplomb
Water, my friend, is a chorus of kinds,
in tune with the rush of what is alive—
dragonfly dipping or a tiny bird’s dive—
assists me to sigh. Water elicits tunes from my soul,
like a moon pulls a tide to a beach or a shoal
I feel akin to all trees in sing-song— wilga or pine,
silky oak, kurrajong—holy songs of belonging,
holy songs of all skin
I sing with the Ghost Bird of my Barkindji friend
hymns for the haunted, hymns for the dead,
a forest of songs for those that have bled
If lovers or children sit under my limbs,
I trill like a blue wren mating in spring,
but when I’m fenced in—
a Municipal Gum— I squawk like ten cockies
for freedoms hard won,
or in a grey-blue-black wind … well, then
I’m a Mick Jagger strutting on stage,
an angry Kurt Cobain smashing guitars in a rage
with each of my Needles and Branchlets engaged
I’ll scatter my Nuts, spread Winged
Seeds from their cage
So don’t fence me in, don’t ask me to hush
I’m a star with choir, a whole repertoire
sound is my lifeblood
that’s how I love, I love, I love, I love
Notes:
‘The Ghost Bird of my Barkindji friend’ refers to poems in a Recent Work Press Publication called Wita Witalana by Paul Collis (2025)
‘Municipal Gum’ references a poem by the same name by Oodgeroo Noonuccal, first published in My People (1975) by Kath Walker, as she was known then
© K A Nelson 2025
