Australian Poetry: Relationships and Connections - Video Reflections on Bruce Dawe - 2 - "Distances"

Living distances will call

insistently, like doves through morning mists,

to haunt earth's lovers whom they hold in thrall

turning the wakeful to somnambulists

~~~

The In-between reverberates, a sea

whose echoing immensity's a voice

half-heard, half-answered when, distracted, we

attempt to make necessity a choice

~~~

Distances define, as presences do

- we live with them and suffer them as much

as if they were a part of me and you,

shadowing gestures, miming every touch...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Modern Australian poet Bruce Dawe is conscious that humanity struggles to find a sense of belonging and identity in 20th to 21st century society.

There is space

But no bridge

There is a voice

But no one hears

There are words

But no meaning

And there are dreams...

What do I mean to others?

What do I mean to me?

What do I mean?

- Gemma Wiseman

I created the following video, based on Dawe's poem "Distances", to highlight the tensions in modern spaces.

After watching the video, consider answers to the following questions:

1. The word "living" in the first line describes "distances". What "extra" does it add to the meaning of "distances"?

2. Doves are calling through the morning mists. What is significant about the choice of a dove? Why not just birds calling, as they do in the morning?

3. "In-between" - Why a capital "I"?

4. In the last stanza, in what way do distances "define"? Define what?

5. "shadowing gestures" - Why not "shadowy"?

6. How can gestures mime a touch rather than just an action?