Anthony W. Pahl

The White Kid ~ circa 1957THE THREE Rs

Five to fifteen, ten bluddy years
I was made to go to school
To learn Reading, ‘Riting ‘n’ ‘Rithmetic
So I wouldn’t look a fool.

We’d start at nine, knock off at three
Every bluddy day
In the arvo when I finished school
Jacky’d be waiting there to play

His school day wasn’t long as mine
An’ was a different type of place
Run by Lutheran missionaries
He learned how to wash his face.

They weren’t bad people, these Lutherans
Bluddy hell, I was one myself
But they spoke English kind of funny
Like they was from someplace else

Jacky didn’t like the place
‘Coz it had a fence of wire
Fe didn’t know what he would do
If the place it caught on fire

‘Coz Jacky said, “How would I get out
And escape in to the bush
With all this wire mesh around
If the place burnt with a whoosh?”

So I reckoned that the best for him
Was to com ‘n join me in me class
But the day I brung him in with me
The teacher caned me arse.

Bluddy hell, I thought, what did I do
That made the teacher wack me bum?
So I swung around and nobbled her
An’ asked what I had done.

“You’ve got to know,” she said to me,
“Aborigines are not allowed.
They got their own place in this world,
And it’s not a part of ours!”

For ten bluddy awful bluddy years
I was made to go to school.
But for the life of me I couldn’t figure out
Who was the bluddy fool.