Tuesday, January 25, 2011

You know, or at least you should know.

Micah 6:8


When I was younger,

more naïve than innocent,

I was happily aware of the privilege

that attends the accident of birth

in this generous land.

Australia, the young and magnificent,

of blue sky, strong sun, gum trees,

parrots and crashing surf;

prospering as both farm and quarry

to the rest of the planet.

We would never go hungry.

Growing older,

I would hear stories from other countries,

and my own; of people for whom life itself

and an occasional full stomach

was the privilege. Humans like me

who weep at cruelty, face daily oppression,

and yearn despairingly for peace.

Children who might never learn to read,

adults who might never cast a vote,

women denied their rightful opportunities,

minorities treated as if they didn’t matter,

indigenous people whose dreamings

are dismissed as a primitive irrelevance,

people cut off from home and country

and waiting for a place of safety and welcome.

My sense of privilege achingly sharpened,

and with it the conviction that these wrongs

should not, must not, go un-righted.

Still later,

I came to hear the ringing words

of the ancient prophet, humbly realising

that the disturbing call to justice

is also my own.


© 2011 Ken Rookes

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