mudunama kundana wandaraba jarribirri: Judy Watson

slipping against darkness and dissolving them lies it's not all gentle here but one day will be again before there was light and dark there was only the world in balance and knowings held in all the places of all care these are not spill marks but tide rushing in across briny mud rippled flat this is not bark but the callouses of time tender to shape around all that grows and knows and exhales its care as dawn light falling upon water these textiles go soft in warp and weave with breath and sigh to wrap up gentle all those troubles come through here every fibre remembers the mark the touch to hold and to be held as everything will be in time to alltime in the leaks the light the memory the claypan Indarri Falls, Boodjamulla Otis Carmichael and mother Judy Watson, O'Shannassy River, Queensland 2000 PP.98–9 water, light, reeds (wanami, mabibarr, bulinja) (detail) 2019 97