Municipal Gum, Analysis for Individual Assessment
Municipal Gum
Gumtree in the city street,
Hard bitumen around your feet,
Rather you should be
In the cool world of leafy forest halls
And wild bird calls
Here you seems to me
Like that poor cart-horse
Castrated, broken, a thing wronged,
Strapped and buckled, its hell prolonged,
Whose hung head and listless mien express
Its hopelessness.
Municipal gum, it is dolorous
To see you thus
Set in your black grass of bitumen--
O fellow citizen,
What have they done to us?
This is a poem by Kath Walker (Oodgeroo Noonuccal)
This poem is talking about what the people have done to the aboriginals. The hard bitumen is the road created by the people showing the change made in the community. Wild birds may refer to relatives and their past life. The poor cart-horse is the way that the aboriginals have been treated and feel. They feel like that they have no more use. The black grass is talking about the aboriginals. The last line tells us that the aboriginals are pretty uncertain and dislike the changes made.
