They Are The First Australians Poem by Francis Duggan

In Australia as in most lands one people's gain is another people's loss
And Australia's first people their eternal cross
Has been the tragedy of dispossession in their own Land
Though their ancestral history in this Country thousands of centuries have spanned

They are the first Australian and of people as Australia's first Race
In this great Southern Country they should command pride of place
Any Australian Indigenous person has never become Prime Minister or Governor General or Premier of any Australian State
For their people's thousands of years in the great southern Country they should have more to celebrate

Of the past 225 years of their recent written history they do not have good stories to tell
By those who have come uninvited to their Country they have not been treated well
They have known of racial intolerance which does seem sad to say
Humans can be so cruel to each other and they have always been this way

For being the first Australans they should have stood to gain
Yet any position of real political power any one of them has yet to attain
For foreign occupation their price was big to pay
For they have been treated badly by those who arrived uninvited from far away.