I peered through a splitting night cloud. Our campfire was burning high. My fraternal beings sang new dreams out. Strange celestial landscapes shone brightly at a distance. In those pearly worlds were other beings. Some carried on their tales in apostasy and had forgotten about the worlds they created below. Their creation was in upheaval. I pitied their creation.

Some other beings stood belligerently at the threshold of their created world and held out flaming cubs in guard. The universe was alive with soul and death. Every virtue that looked lost was indeed resurrected in another dimension. I looked around the sky field and then below.

That world. That red world we rose to make. What irony its inhabitants thought our feelings little. What pity. What shame. I wondered what time was sworn upon our deeds again.

So many things had happened to the red world we created. I remembered the beginning of time. The highest hand of wisdom had stirred us from our splendid languor. We rose in endless pillars to sort out the mess that marked the pre-history of the red world. In our splendid dances, we seduced the rain out of nothing and the sun from a dirty red speck. We snapped dried tenuous twigs and they became rivaling waters. With our molding hands we shaped mountains out of debris. In our divine plays, we called forth the spirits of animals and birds. Everything stood beautiful at the beginning of time. We worshipped the very essence of creation. The golden night skies held us the most fancy. With the sprinkle of our dust, stars sprouted like fresh leaves glistening in a dewy sun.

we marked out crystal bowls for the wake of the morning.

How beautiful our red world looked.

But simple things flee the rage of time.

Dissatisfied beings rose among our earthly camp and sought to snatch our red world for their sinister aims. In their awkward visions they strove to make our red world the haven of bellicose spirits wandering from blacks mountains etched in the outbacks of the universe. The strange sprits brought with them bizarre magic and swayed our unpatriotic brothers into a lying scourging.

We pleaded with them to return to perfect dreamtime but their hearts were sworn on courting evil. Before our very eyes, they abhorred the strange spirits and together they made war on us. First, they stretched a gloom across the face of the sun and the world went cold for years. We fought them back with our dreaming epics and rescued the sun but it already had an irredeemable blur. Our tumultuous clashes with the evils ruffled our magnificent world. We removed the moon from a leaning gum tree and placed her in a round silver gleam up in the sky.

We scattered bonded land into many pieces in our epic clashes with the evils. We carried our battle to gentle pools of water. The gentle pools turned belligerent. We waged wars in far skies and made our greatest slay of the enemies in the heights. Their blood spattered on blue clouds. We swore a deed that the stained clouds appear from time to time to remind the red world of our prowess.

We could not bear the desecrated sight of the beautiful red world we created. We left for new celestial camps but left earthly children to keep our memory. We consecrated our last foothold on the red world as The Land Of The Dreamtime. We endowed our offspring with abundance of choice animals. We taught them to reach us in corroborees⁽¹⁾. We gave them sacred laws to keep the red world from further decay.

For many ages, our earthly children lived in peace and prosperity, basking in the entire blessings we gave them. We would stand at the cloudy threshold of our red world and listen to them sing with the sacred didgeridoo. How blissful the age of the second dreamtime.

But simple things flee the rage of time.

The second scourge of our red world broke loose.

Pale sailing imps, all homeless, hungry, but fiendish stumbled upon the land of our dreamtime. When they saw all the blessings we bestowed upon our earthly children, they conjured up the spirits of beings we had fought in the first scourge. They carried on the nefarious history. They poached our earthly children with their wicked magic. They infested them with strange ailments, brought them wrecking liquors, and set loose creepy wanderers that stole the food of our children. Our children fought back bravely but toiled fruitlessly against the pale sailing imps. We watched in sorrow as the innocent blood of our own cried to us in bitter death. With our timeless eyes we traced their tears to every stygian coven and gaol. The pale imps sought to wipe away our immemorial name from the red world. We possessed our earthly children and drove their hearts through the second scourge. With our higher wisdom we gave them hope to live through the evil gloom. In their squa! lor, they had passion. For their pain, we gave the timeless riches of our history.

I looked back at my fraternal beings. They were bunched together in esoteric dreams. Pure passions roamed the far skies of the universe.

I bent closer to the cloudy thresholds of our red world. I heard a strain of the hallowed didgeridoo. Our earthly children were still alive and good. The still passions of deathly years had failed to calm their feisty spirit. I heard the music of a merry corroboree. My immortal heart skipped surly bounds of joy. I know nothing can wipe out great Kapukarri⁽²⁾ from the red world. Evil can never wrest a frill of life from us.

I drew away from the cloudy thresholds and walked back to our camp to sing a new dreaming with my fraternal beings.

(1) Corroboree - Dance performances of Australian Aboriginal nations.
(2) Kapukarri - The history.