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The Music

From our latest self titled album:
Room For Us All Willing Salt Accolades

From our previous album 'Belle Curve':
 Coming Out Blues Triage


Triage

Many people's image of triaging (determining the order of priority of casualties for treatment) comes from television medical dramas, where high-tech emergency departments are staffed by gleaming professionals who share perfect dentition and an obsession with medical abbreviations.

Things are very different in remote Australian communities which are often understaffed and underfunded, and where Aboriginal Health Workers, Remote Area Nurses and other staff can spend their entire lives "on call" with seemingly impossible workloads.

The song Triage tells a true story of such a place, 1800 kilometres from the nearest major hospital.

I had flown in to a remote West Australian Health Centre to participate in a clinic whose sole permanent staff member was a Registered Nurse.

On this particular day the temperature was well over 40 degrees Celsius. The Health Centre was usually powered by a generator, but this had failed, and the phones were down. A full and frantic clinic was interrupted by a raucous and bloody fight on the red dirt track outside the health centre. The injured had only just begun to filter into the clinic when word came of a road accident just outside of town. The passenger was jammed into a crushed vehicle, which had "rolled" on a corner. After 2 hours at the accident site, we returned to the clinic. I asked the Registered Nurse how she coped with days like this. She answered " I take a deep breath and say Om". With that she took a deep breath and resumed work.

Guitar and vocals for Triage are provided by Darwin singer-songwriter Mary-Lynn Griffith. Belinda Gehlert (of Kenny's Window ) provides violin mayhem and beauty.

 

 

(2.1Mb) Opens the Track Triage in your default media player

knew a woman way outback
maps and pictures lined her shack
creekbed full of green and slime
only ran at cyclone time

how'd she stand the heat and flies
dust and grog and storeman's lies
how'd she stand the taunts and jeers
why'd she stay so many years
she would say

when there's chaos all around
ugly gesture ugly sound
I take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om
I take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om

visitors would come and go
tell her what she ought to know
nodding at the things she'd say
sighing as they flew away

how'd she stand the heat and flies
dust and grog and storeman's lies
how'd she stand the pain and tears
why'd she stay so many years
she would say

when there's chaos all around
ugly gesture ugly sound
I take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om
when the blood is flowing fast
people screaming, rushing past
I take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om
I take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om

some who saw behind the smile
stopped their preaching for a while
opened up their ears instead
to her wisdom softly shed

never mind the heat and flies
prejudice of city eyes
if you stayed a year or two
you would love this country too
she would say

when there's chaos all around
ugly gesture ugly sound
I take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om
when the blood is flowing fast
people screaming, rushing past
I take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om
take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say om
take a deep, take a deep, take a deep breath
and say
om ...

© bennett

 

   

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