Train Journey by Judith Wright
Glassed with cold sleep and dazzled by the moon,
out of the confused hammering dark of the train
I looked and saw under the moon’s cold sheet
your delicate dry breasts, country that built my heart;
and the small trees on their uncoloured slope
like poetry moved, articulate and sharp
and purposeful under the great dry flight of air,
under the crosswise currents of wind and star.
Clench down your strength, box-tree and ironbark.
Break with your violent root the virgin rock.
Draw from the flying dark its breath of dew
till the unliving come to life in you.
Be over the blind rock a skin of sense,
under the barren height a slender dance…
I woke and saw the dark small trees that burn
suddenly into flowers more lovely than the white moon.
Analysis
Poet Judith Wright wrote Train Journey in 1953. It is a reflection of her experiences riding on trains and homage to the landscape that she sees while travelling.
The narrative of Train Journey enters a moment in time where the speaker has recently woken up during the middle of a train ride. It is nighttime over a vast, rural Australian area, where the moon lights up the landscape which the speaker describes. Though more prose in overall structure, the syllables per line in Train Journey are consistently similar, ranging from 10-12 counts. When read aloud, the poem follows closely to a 4/4 time signature, which feels stable and constant, as well as being comparable to the ‘clickety-clack’ patterns that are generated from a train’s wheels rolling over railway tracks. There are 16 lines in total, with each stanza containing a number of lines that 16 can be divided into. This also contributes to the sense of pattern and consistency provided by the rhythm of the poem, as well as adds a sense of completion at the end of line 16.
Wright begins Train Journey by implying a sense of discomfort and homesickness when the speaker is described to be “glassed with cold sleep” and awoken by the “confused hammering dark of the train” (Wright 1953, 1-2). It is not at all described where the speaker’s destination is in the poem. However, Wright demonstrates a sense of comfort, appreciation and nostalgia in the speaker when they see the moonlit view of the land outside. It is described as part of a “country that built [their] heart”, and with the context of Wright’s background and previous works, the poem is set in Australia’s Eastern and South-Eastern regions (4). Additionally, the mention of “box-tree and ironbark,” strengthens the relationship the speaker has with the land, knowing that these trees grow in the regions where the poem is set in (9). Although it is unknown when and where the journey ends, the speaker finds comfort and a sense of home in the Australian land outside.
Through literary techniques, Wright captures how significant the Australian land is to her. In Train Journey, imagery is used very prominently throughout the poem to emphasise the speaker’s feelings present in every line. The speaker also addresses the overall land with second-person pronouns with every mention, anthropomorphising it. Using personification, the speaker describes the land to have human-specific qualities and abilities, such as having “delicate dry breasts” to describe the land’s curvature and beauty, as well as the ability to “clench down [its] strength, box-tree and ironbark” and “Draw from the flying dark its breath of dew” to show how it maintain its natural beauty (4, 9, 11). Wright also briefly uses other techniques like simile to describe the way the speaker sees the trees move, being “like poetry”, and rhymes that fall on and bring attention to important nouns that build imagery of the land and strengthen its meaning to the speaker (6).
Overall, Judith Wright’s Train Journey showcases the importance of Australia’s landscapes and captures the strong relationship that she has with it, her homeland.
Resources
artsQueensland. “Who was Judith Wright?”. Judith Wright Arts Centre - artsQueensland. Queensland Government. n.d. Web. <https://www.arts.qld.gov.au/judith-wright-centre-brisbane/who-was-judith-wright>
EUCLID. “Eucalyptus albens”. Lucid Apps. CANBR. 2020. Web. <https://apps.lucidcentral.org/euclid/text/entities/eucalyptus_albens.htm>
Narangba Timbers. “Know Your Timber: Ironbark”. Narangba Timbers. Narangba Timbers. n.d. Web. <https://narangbatimbers.com.au/know-timber-ironbark/>
WT Landcare Flora Index. “Yellow Box”. Woolshed Thurgoona Landcare Group. Woolshed Thurgoona Landcare Group. n.d. Web. <https://wtlandcare.org/details/eucalyptus-melliodora/>
Wright, Judith. “Train Journey”. Collected poems : 1942-1985. Ed. Angus & Robertson. N.S.W: Pymble, 1994. 1953.
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