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Dawn is at hand Oodgoroo Noonuccal (Kath Walker)
Dark brothers, first Australian race,
Soon you will take you rightful place In the brotherhood long waited for, Fringe-dwellers no more.
Sore, sore the tears you shed
When hope seemed folly and justice dead. Was the long night weary? Look up, dark band, The dawn is at hand
Go forward proudly and unafraid
To your birthright all too long delayed, For soon now the shame of the past Will be over at last.
You will be welcomed mateship-wise
In industry and in enterprise; No profession will bar the door, Fringe-dwellers no more.
Dark and white upon common ground
In club and office and social round, Yours the feel of a friendly land The grip of the hand
Sharing the same equality
In college and university, All ambitions of hand or brain Yours to attain.
For ban and bias will soon be gone,
The future beckons you bravely on To art and letters and nation lore, Fringe-dwellers no more.
Author Introduction: Oodgeroo Noonuccal (known as Kath Walker until 1988) was born in 1920 in Australia. The first Aboriginal Australian to publish a book of verse, she is the author of four collections of poetry, including We Are Going (1964), The Dawn is at Hand (1966), and My People: A Kath Walker Collection (1970). Her works of fiction and children’s books include Stradbroke Dreamtime (1972), Father Sky and Mother Earth (1981), and The Rainbow Serpent (1988). Noonuccal became a prominent activist of Aboriginal rights and a critic of the Australian government; she served on several boards, councils, and committees ranging from the local to national level. In 1970, she was selected as a Member of the Order of the British Empire, but she returned the award in 1988. Her other honors include the Jessie Litchfield Award, the Mary Gilmore Award, and the Fellowship of Australian Writers’ Award. Noonuccal was an educator, and purchased a property she called Moongalba on North Stradbroke Island, Queensland, where visitors could learn about nature and Aboriginal culture. She died in 1993. Summary of the Poem: The poet expresses a subjective perception of the colonization that erupted in Australia over 150 years. This poem presents a non-optimistic perspective on the future of Aboriginal Australians.
Walker encourages the ingenious Australians to attain their own rights because they were become outsiders for so long in their native land. The people were in agony and shed their tears. The poet suggests them to consider this as a dark, weary night and she highlights the dawn as a new era which symbolize hope and the possibility of the changes.
They were faced injustice and dominated by those Europeans, but also emphasis their resilience and determination to overcome these challenges. She calls for unity and solidarity among indigenous people, urging them to rise up and fight for their rights. In this poem she enlightened the spirits of equality and rights by stating that the people should not feel inferior in college, universities, club, office and society. There is no professional restriction to deny aboriginal, they should be treated equally in industries and enterprises. There should be no color discrimination and everyone has to be free in this friendly land. She stressed that we should work hard and achieves our goals to change our dark situation. She ignites the future generation to be brave and expose their thoughts through arts and literature to the world. The biased and injustice has soon to be disappear and there is no more fringe-dwellers.
Theme of the Poem: The poem calls for a new era where Indigenous people are no longer marginalized and oppressed. But instead, they are empowered and respected. It serves as a powerful expression of hope and determination for a better future for Indigenous community.
Title of the poem: ‘Dawn is a hand’ symbolize new era of rights and equality. It shows the optimistic and encouraging tone towards the indigenous Australians who were oppressed by colonization.
Geographical context: Indigenous Australians are people with familial heritage of, the various ethnic groups living within the territory of present day Australia prior to British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups, which includes many ethnic groups: the Aboriginal Australians of the mainland and many islands, including Tasmania, and the Torres Strait Islanders of the seas between Queensland and Papua New Guinea, located in Melanesia. The term Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples or the person's specific cultural group, is often preferred, though the terms First Nations of Australia, First Peoples of Australia and First Australians are also increasingly common; 812,728 people self-identified as being of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander origin in the 2021 Australian Census, representing 3.2% of the total population of Australia. Of these Indigenous Australians, 91.4% identified as Aboriginal; 4.2% identified as Torres Strait Islander; while 4.4% identified with both groups. Since 1995, the Australian Aboriginal flag and the Torres Strait Islander flag have been official flags of Australia.
Historical context: Settlers colonialism in Australia is the elimination of Indigenous Australians and their replacement by a settler society. Initially carried out by violence such as “massacre, forced starvation, poisoning, rape, disease and incarceration”. Nowadays the settler colonialism continues in the form of cultural assimilation. Fringe-dwellers: This term used in Australia to describe groups of Aboriginal Australians who camp on the outskirts of towns and cities, from which they have become excluded, generally through law or land alienation as a result of colonisation.
Figure of speech: Alliteration: the use of the same consonant sounds at the beginning of word, dead-dark, soon-shame. Repetition: Fringe-dwellers no more. Consonance: Consonance is the repetition of consonant sounds in the same line, lore-more, ground-round. Allegory: is a narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a meaning with moral or political significance. COLONISATION.
