Published in Overland Issue The 2017 Oodgeroo Noonuccal Poetry Prize · Uncategorized Highly Commended: An Arrival Grace Lucas-Pennington We came across water made shore in darkness woke on sand. We saw strong young men, warriors. They came towards us, pointed their weapons at us. They asked us who we were, why we had come. Sat us down on the earth to wait. They gave us water. We were weak from travel, exhausted. News spread. They came, the delegates. Stern folk who smiled cold like the ones we ran from. Healers came. They had travelled overnight to reach us. The nurses, the doctors they closed their mouths. Their lips did not know the shape of the desperation they saw in bodies, in faces. Their hearts did not know the strange strength of the hope under our flesh. But their eyes knew the stories of the scars. Their bones had not known the weight of those who had died on the journey. Their hands did not know the shape of the fears we carried. But they saw the long shadows stretching out behind us. They did not understand us, or we them. But to hope is to open and through it we are opened. So it began. Image: Brisbane Waters sunset Grace Lucas-Pennington Grace Lucas-Pennington is a Bundjalung/European person living on Yugurapul land. She grew up mostly between Bundjalung country on the NSW north coast and the greater Logan/Brisbane area. Grace is currently the Editor for State Library of Queensland’s black&write! Indigenous Writing and Project. More by Grace Lucas-Pennington › Overland is a not-for-profit magazine with a proud history of supporting writers, and publishing ideas and voices often excluded from other places. If you like this piece, or support Overland’s work in general, please subscribe or donate. Related articles & Essays First published in Overland Issue 228 8 December 2023 · Fiction Fiction | The Victims Emma Jayne Willson Every morning I checked the Director’s calendar to ensure there were no meeting clashes, no opportunity for her polished façade to slip. Once I’d made the mistake of booking two meetings without leaving ten minutes between them, thus forcing her to run across the sprawling campus. She arrived late for her meeting with the Provost, […] First published in Overland Issue 228 7 December 20238 December 2023 · Food Righteous appetites: the dilemmas of the ethical omnivore’s diet Jaimee Edwards The pastoral is our setting for the good life that puts the 'ethical' in 'ethical sausage'. The websites for small-scale farms and ethical meat butchers around the world look like brochures for retirement living. Together, the happy animals, their conscientious handlers, and ceremonial butchers form a picture of aligned values.
