Money Purchases Only Pearls Poem by Terence George Craddock (Spectral Images and Images Of Light)

“Such a nice girl
funny she never married.
Such a nice girl
money purchases only pearls.”

Times past money
also purchased colonial slaves.

“Wisdom Sentimentality Sincerity.
Are free
inflating hearts that can be.
Above risen
treacherous currents
embroiled
in bitter judgement misty
dark green sea.”

Transportation
punished both major and petty
crimes in penal
transportation seven year sentence
or life to America.

To return home
a capital offence
execution by
judicial process.

Exile thought
a crime major deterrent.

Transportation
to America seen as a humane
profit productive
alternative to execution.

Penal transportation
free labour practical profitable
convicts bled to economically
develop colonial territories.

Transportation crime
often; only stealing a loaf of bread
to feed a starving family.


Quoted lines adapted from ‘Penal Transportation: Forgotten Gaelic Slaves’. See also‘The Saga Of A Convict Lass’, the original template poem for a collage of poems, symbolic of collective convict suffering, yet unique experiences of individuals, during the penal transportation period; ‘Flogged Upon Rack At Sea’ and ‘Sentenced For The Term Of Her Natural Life’ by Terence George Craddock.
Copyright © Terence George Craddock
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