Near Where The Tarwin Waters Flow Poem by Francis Duggan

On a stringybark in a flat paddock I can hear the pale eyed crow
Cawing in the early morning near where the Tarwin waters flow
On towards the great Pacific it slowly winds it's way
By the narrow road to Tarwin Lower that end up at Venus Bay.

This land as old as father time renowned in lore and song
Once home to the indigenous tribe known as the Bunurong
By the waters of the Tarwin they danced their Corroborees
When the magpie's voice was carrying in the freshening evening breeze.

In the age of human innocence that inspired old bards to rhyme
They danced and told their marvellous stories of their historic Dreamtime
How the magpie got his colours why the roo must hop and bound
Why the wombat must keep digging in his big hole in the ground.

Long before sailor Cook's arrival from that distant rainy shore
The Bunurong had lived in this country for sixty thousand years or more
And though nothing lasts forever and nothing stays the same
Occupancy for dispossession seems a much more pleasant name.

In a land as old as time itself with an Aboriginal history
The waters of the Tarwin goes whispering towards the sea
And the pale eyed crow is cawing and the shrike thrush pipes his song
In the great land of the Dreamtime of the ancient Bunurong.