DSM 401. Bora Ring. 2027

The poem also describes the disappearance of the hunter. His spear is broken and buried, symbolising the end of the traditional way of life. The memory of the people, whose bodies were once painted for ceremonies, is compared to a dream that the world has breathed in and forgotten. This means that their culture has gradually faded from human memory, just as a dream disappears after we wake up. The people who once travelled freely have now become still, suggesting that their lives and traditions have come to an end.

Finally, a person riding a horse stops near the empty Bora Ring. The rider suddenly feels sadness and fear. This feeling is described as “the fear as old as Cain,” referring to the ancient biblical story of Cain and Abel, which is associated with conflict and guilt. The expression suggests a deep feeling of sorrow and guilt over the loss of the Indigenous people, their culture, and their traditional way of life.

Overall, the poem expresses sadness over the disappearance of Indigenous Australian culture. It shows how an ancient way of life has been forgotten by society, even though nature continues to preserve traces of its past. The poet reminds us of the importance of remembering and respecting the culture, history, and traditions of Indigenous people.

The poem begins by stating that the music and ceremonies of the Aboriginal people who once used this bora ring are no longer performed. The phrase “the dance is secret with the dancers in the earth” is a metaphorical way of saying that the people who knew these traditions are now dead and buried. Their cultural knowledge died with them, and it is now hidden or kept “secret” in the ground where they lie.

The specific ceremonies and religious practices (“ritual”) that were performed here no longer have a purpose because the community that practiced them is gone. The history and oral traditions of the tribe (“the tribal story”) have also disappeared. They have been replaced by the culture and history of the settlers, which is described as an “alien tale” because it is foreign and did not originate from this land.

The only physical evidence left of the sacred ceremonial site is from nature itself. The grass grows in a way that shows the circular shape of the bora ring, the place where dances were held. The “apple-gums,” a type of Australian eucalyptus tree, stand around the ring like silent witnesses.

The poet describes the trees as if they were people. Their twisted shapes swaying in the wind look like they're imitating the Aboriginal corroboree, a ceremonial dance once held on that land. The wind rustling through the leaves sounds like a faint murmur, a half-forgotten voice singing a broken chant. Together, these images suggest that nature keeps only a weak, fragmented memory of the past, and that memory is incomplete and fading.

This line deepens the sense of irreversible loss. The “painted bodies” are no longer physical realities but have become only “a dream the world breathed sleeping and forgot.” What was once a living, visible part of Aboriginal ceremony and identity has faded into a half-remembered vision that the modern world briefly held and then carelessly abandoned. The image of the world “breathing” the dream while asleep suggests a passive, unconscious erasure rather than a deliberate act of memory. The final statement of the stanza, “The nomad feet are still,” completes the picture of cultural stillness: the wandering life of the Aboriginal people has ceased, their movement across the land permanently halted.

The next stanza shifts attention from the vanished Aboriginal world to the modern observer. “Only the rider’s heart / halts at a sightless shadow” shows that the loss is no longer felt by the land or by the absent people themselves, but only by a solitary passer-by whose heart momentarily pauses. The “sightless shadow” and the “unsaid word” suggest something sensed yet never fully grasped or spoken—an awareness that a whole way of life has disappeared and will never return. The final image, “to dance with the moonlight under the gum trees,” recalls the lost ceremonies with quiet poignancy, emphasising that the ancient dances are gone forever and can no longer take place beneath the trees that once witnessed them.

The phrase “that fastens in the blood of the ancient curse” intensifies the emotional impact on the rider. The “unsaid word” does not remain a fleeting thought; it sinks deep into the blood, becoming an inescapable part of the observer’s being. The “ancient curse” refers to the lasting consequences of colonial dispossession and cultural destruction—the historical wrong that continues to haunt the present. Even though the Aboriginal people and their ceremonies have vanished, their absence still exerts a powerful, almost physical hold on those who now occupy the land.

This feeling the rider experiences is connected to a deep, inherited guilt. The “ancient curse” refers to the violent history of colonization and the dispossession of the Aboriginal people. The final line compares the rider’s feeling of guilt and fear to that of Cain, a figure from the Bible who murdered his own brother, Abel. This comparison suggests that the conflict between settlers and Indigenous people was like a brother turning against a brother, and the land itself now carries the memory and guilt of that violence.