My Party is the Party of Aragon by Dorothy Hewett
Dorothy Hewett was a renowned Australian poet, novelist and playwright, born in the Australian Wheat Belt. She was a member of the Communist Party of Australia for over two decades ultimately resigning over the Soviet intervention in Czechoslovakia in 1968. Her prolific career featured poetry on the lives of working people and the struggle for socialism as well as love and her own experiences.
Here we feature her poem My Party is the Party of Aragon, a stunning tribute to working class struggle, art and history on every continent.
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I am not alone … in the beating of my heart
Are the songs of Lumumba, the poems of Pablo Neruda.
‘The Rail Splitters Awake’ in my heart each morning,
Brecht’s lost children wander through the Polish snow,
With Nazim Hikmet I will see beautiful days,
And my Party is the Party of Aragon.
I have loved all beautiful things,
Flowers and music and Robeson’s songs,
Seeger’s guitar and Woody Guthrie singing,
The Tennessee Valley blooming under his lips.
Tom Joad on the dusty road to California,
With the cold steel ringing, singing in his heart.
I have loved them all, the battlers, the lonely men
Who are never alone, in the beating of their hearts
Are the strong men with the sun coming up in their eyes.
My Party’s given all this back to me;
A land in bloom, a follower to the stars,
And a black world made beautiful with rain.
The Southern Cross swings over Bowling’s chains, My Party Is the Party of Aragon
I am not alone … in the beating of my heart
Are the songs of Lumumba, the poems of Pablo Neruda.
‘The Rail Splitters Awake’ in my heart each morning,
Brecht’s lost children wander through the Polish snow,
With Nazim Hikmet I will see beautiful days,
And my Party is the Party of Aragon.
I have loved all beautiful things,
Flowers and music and Robeson’s songs,
Seeger’s guitar and Woody Guthrie singing,
The Tennessee Valley blooming under his lips.
Tom Joad on the dusty road to California,
With the cold steel ringing, singing in his heart.
I have loved them all, the battlers, the lonely men
Who are never alone, in the beating of their hearts
Are the strong men with the sun coming up in their eyes.
My Party’s given all this back to me;
A land in bloom, a follower to the stars,
And a black world made beautiful with rain.
The Southern Cross swings over Bowling’s chains,
The five fierce stars to wrap Tom Edwards in.
And Lawson walks the Sydney streets again, sardonic Steelman,
Sweeney at his side; now Clancy rides his last triumphant ride.
Oh! all my world has changed and grown, it shines
Like the eyes of miners in the Isa mines.
I ride the Freedom Train with Langston Hughes across America.
I’ve loved them all, the tumult of their voices,
Seaman, and steelman, wharfie, weaver, poet.
I am not alone, in the beating of my heart
Are the voices singing, singing on the high wind
And my Party is the Party of Aragon.
Dorothy Hewett
