Saturday, August 1, 2009

STATE OF (AB)ORIGIN

There are perhaps 200 languages
and several more dialects they say
unique, unrelated to each other
alas, most are extinct today

The one that's given us the most words
is Dharug, apparently, spoken by the Kooris
from those original settlers around what we call Sydney
comes boomerangs, wombats, koalas and wallabies

From Riverine region languages like Wiradjuri
we get billabong and kookaburra
while the Kamiloroi or Kooma
have given us the budgerigar

Didgeridoo is from the musical tribe, the Yolngu
up north in Arnhem Land
Billinudgel, a place of plentiful sparrows
from the Biripi, near Byron's golden sand

Such a huge compendium of words from millenia
yet to few of them do we ever recourse
it's time we took some interest (and pride)
and used 'em imaginatively in our modern discourse