Lisa Bellear

Lisa Bellear Poems

Lisa Bellear Biography

Lisa (Marie) Bellear (born, Melbourne, Victoria, 2 May 1961 – died, Melbourne, 5 July 2006) was an Indigenous Australian poet, photographer, activist, spokeswoman, dramatist, comedian and broadcaster. She was a Goernpil woman of the Noonuccal people of Minjerribah (Stradbroke Island), Queensland. Her uncles were Bob Bellear, Australia's first Indigenous judge, and Sol Bellear who helped to found the Aboriginal Housing Corporation in Redfern in 1972. Bellear was adopted into a white family as a baby and was told she had Polynesian heritage . As an adult she explored her Aboriginal roots. Bellear died unexpectedly at her home in Melbourne. She was 45 years old. Published works and photography Bellear wrote Dreaming In Urban Areas (UQP, 1996), a book of poetry which explores the experience of Aboriginal people in contemporary society. She said in an interview with Roberta Sykes that her 'poetry was not about putting down white society. It's about self-discovery.' Other poetry was published in journals and newspapers. She was awarded the Deadly prize in 2006 for making an outstanding contribution to literature with her play The Dirty Mile: A History of Indigenous Fizroy, a suburb of Melbourne. Bellear was a prolific photographer. Her work was exhibited at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games and at the Melbourne Museum as part of their millennium celebrations. Community activities Bellear was a broadcaster at the community radio station 3CR in Melbourne where she presented the show 'Not Another Koori Show' for over 20 years. She was also a founding member of the Ilbijerri Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Theatre Co-op, the longest-running Aboriginal theatre troupe in Australia. Ilbijerri produced The Dirty Mile in March 2006 as a dramatised walking trail through the streets of Fitzroy, Melbourne.)

The Best Poem Of Lisa Bellear

Women's Liberation

Talk to me about the feminist movement,
the gubba middle class
hetero sexual revolution
way back in the seventies
when men wore tweed jackets with
leather elbows, and the women, well
I don’t remember or maybe I just don’t care
or can’t relate.
Now what were those white women on about?
What type of neurosis was fashionable back then?
So maybe I was only a school kid; and kids, like women,
have got on thing that joins that schemata,
like we’re not worth listening to,
and who wants to liberate women and children
what will happen in an egalitarian society
if the women and the kids start becoming complacent
in that they believe they should have rights
and economic independence,
and what would these middle class kids and white women do
with liberation, with freedom, with choices of
do I stay with my man, do I fall in love with other
white middle class women, and it wouldn’t matter if
my new woman had kids or maybe even kids and dogs
Yes I’m for the women’s movement
I want to be free and wear dunlop tennis shoes.
And indigenous women, well surely, the liberation
of white women includes all women regardless . . .
It doesn’t, well that’s not for me to deal with
I mean how could I, a white middle class woman,
who is deciding how can I budget when my man won’t
pay the school fees and the diner’s card club simply
won’t extend credit.
I don’t even know if I’m capable
of understanding
Aborigines, in Victoria?
Aboriginal women, here, I’ve never seen one,
and if I did, what would I say,
damned if I’m going to feel guilty, for wanting something
better for me, for women in general, not just white
middle class Volvo driving, part time women’s studies
students
Maybe I didn’t think, maybe I thought women in general
meant, Aboriginal women, the Koori women in Victoria
Should I apologise
should I feel guilty
Maybe the solution is to sponsor
a child through world vision.
Yes that’s probably best,
I feel like I could cope with that,
Look, I’d like to do something for our Aborigines
but I haven’t even met one,
and if I did I would say
all this business about land rights, maybe I’m a bit
scared, what’s it mean, that some day I’ll wake up
and there will be this flag, what is it, you know
red, black and that yellow circle, staked out front
and then what, Okay I’m sorry, I feel guilt
is that what I should be shouting
from the top of the rialto building
The women’s movement saved me
maybe the 90s will be different.
I’m not sure what I mean, but I know that although
it’s not just a women’s liberation that will free us
it’s a beginning

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