Concrete Poems

Finger Print Poem

Analysis of Micrography

The words used to make this micrography are the lyrics from the song voice of truth by Casting Crowns. The words are arranged to look like a cross on a hill with the sun setting behind it. It’s coloured differently to make it more effective. The cross represents Jesus and so does the song. The main chorus is used.

 ‘But the voice of truth tells me a different story

And the voice of truth says “Do not be afraid!”

And the voice of truth says “This is for my glory.”

Out of all the voices calling out to me

 I choose to listen and believe the voice of truth               

                                                                           

Typeography Assignment

Cause there's b l a c k,
And there's w h i t e.
And there's  wrong,
And there's  right.

‘Black and White’ by Royal Taylor

That's how you change the w o r l d
Oh oh oh oh (Change the w o r l d)
That's how you change the w o r l d
Oh oh oh oh (Change the w o r l d)

‘That’s How You Change The World’ by Newsboys

 We all wanna  be  somebody ,

 we just need a  t a s t e  of who we are

We all wanna  be  somebody ,

we’re willing to go but   not that      far

We all wanna  be  somebody , we just need a  t a s t e  of   who we are

We all wanna  be  somebody ,

we’re willing to go but   not that      far

‘Be Somebody’ by Thousand Foot Krutch

                          

                            "That's How You Change The World"

That's how you change the world
That's how you change the world

All my life I had big dreams
To do big things and make a change
And all the while, I just passed by
The simple needs right here next to me

'Cause there's a breaking heart
That's fallin' apart
And tear filled eyes lookin' back at me
God, won't you help me to see

It's the prayer in an empty room
Little things we do when nobody's around
A hand reaching out to a heart in doubt
It's the smallest spark that can light the dark

That's how you change the world
Oh oh oh oh (Change the world)
That's how you change the world
Oh oh oh oh (Change the world)

A million little drops of rain
Can be enough to cause a tidal wave
A flood of Your love
That no one can contain

'Cause there's an empty soul
That wants to be known
Around me now, that I can lead to You
Revealing love that won't refuse

It's the kind words
A simple smile
More than showin' up
Going the extra mile
It's giving everything
When you've got nothin' left
Sharin' a little hope
With a single breath

That's how you change the world
That's how you change the world

It's the prayer in an empty room
A hand reaching out to a heart in doubt

By the Newsboys

                                          "Be Somebody"

I’m just the boy inside the man, not exactly who you think I am
Trying to trace my steps back here again so many times
I’m just a speck inside your hand, you came and made me who I am
I remember where it all began so clearly

I feel a million miles away, still you connect me in your way
And you create in me something I would’ve never seen

When I could only see the floor, you made my window a door
So when they say they don’t believe, I hope that they see you in me

After all the lights go down, I’m just the words you are the sound
A strange type of chemistry, how you’ve become a part of me
And when I sit alone at night, your thoughts burn through me like a fire
You’re the only one who knows who I really am.

We all wanna be somebody, we just need a taste of who we are.
We all wanna be somebody, we’re willing to go but not that far.

And we’re all see through, just like glass
And we can shatter just as fast
That light’s been burned out for a while,
I still see it every time I pass
It was lost in the corners of my mind,
Behind a box of reasons why
I never doubted it was there,
It just took a little time to find and even when...

I feel a million miles away, still you connect me in your way
And you create in me something I would’ve never seen

When I could only see the floor, you made my window a door
So when they say they don’t believe I hope that they see you in me

After all the lights go down, I’m just the words you are the sound
A strange type of chemistry, how you’ve become a part of me
And when I sit alone at night, your thoughts burn through me like a fire
You’re the only one who knows who I really am

We all wanna be somebody, we just need a taste of who we are
We all wanna be somebody, we’re willing to go but not that far
We all wanna be somebody, we just need a taste of who we are
We all wanna be somebody, we’re willing to go but not that far

I’m just the boy inside the man, not exactly who you think I am
Trying to trace my steps back here again so many times

When I could only see the floor, you made my window a door
So when they say they don’t believe, I hope that they see you in me

                                             "Black & White"

Cause you've been on my mind.
Been drifting for quite sometime.
This life is paralysing,
This life is paralysing, me.

I can't see through the greys,
Truth has been lost in the haze,
And I need someone to save me.

[Chorus]
Truth's all I want,
All I want, is You.
You're all I want,
All I want, All I want.

Cause there's black,
And there's white.
And there's wrong,
And there's right.

I can't go, one more night,
Without telling you,
That I am sorry.
For all the pain that I caused.

I've been gone, for so long,
Without telling you that I am sorry.
Can you hear me?
Please forgive me!

I'm screaming through the noise,
Tell me that You can hear my voice.
I am so lost without You,
I am so lost without You here.

I need some clarity,
Need Your spirit leading me.
My vision's getting blurry.

[Chorus]
Truth's all I want,
All I want, is You.
Truth's all I want,
All I want, All I want, All I want.

Cause there's black,
And there's white.
And there's wrong,
And there's right.

I can't go, one more night,
Without telling you,
That I am sorry.
For all the pain that I caused.

I've been gone, for so long,
Without telling You that I am sorry.
Can you hear me?
Please forgive me!

Oh, oh.

I've been trapped in this maze,
For so long,
Show me the way,
Back home.

Open my eyes,
To see You.

Tada dada da da

[Chorus]
Truth's all I want,
All I want, is You.
Truth's all I want,
All I want, All I want.

There's black,
And there's white.
And there's wrong,
And there's right.

I can't go, one more night,
Without telling you,
That I am sorry.
For all the pain that I caused.

I've been gone, for so long,
Without telling you that I am sorry.
Can you hear me?
Please forgive me.

Forgive me.

Cause you've been on my mind,
I've been drifting for quite some time.
This life is paralyzing,
This life is paralyzing me.

On Fire!

Rough Draft

On Fire!

By Chloe Laing

My Dad says he’s not a hero because anyone can do it if you had the right training and recourses.  “We are all ordinary. We are all boring. We are all spectacular. We are all shy. We are all bold. We are all heroes. We are all helpless. It just depends on the day.” Brad Meltzer. My dad would agree with this.

Each fire looks a little different but it can look like a horizontal cyclone 2-3 meters high. The head of the fire can be 30-40 meters high and that’s as high as 2 power poles and the biggest fire he fought was 30,000 ha in area and took over three hours to drive around the perimeter. He took us for a drive around it after he had put it out. It affected six different communities. The wall of the fire was layered. The smoke is black as night with an orange glow and it’s so thick it makes your eyes feel like they are bleeding.

A fire can get so hot that you can feel the heat from 100 meters away and it can make you feel like your burning, it can make your boots start melting and your nose start running.

Once my Dad was in his red truck and the head of the fire passed over him and he said it was so loud it sounded like a freight train going past or a cyclone and you could easily hear it over the sound of the people in his truck talking, the roar of the engine, and the radio communications chatter.

Every fire can smell different depending on what its burning. It can smell nice like pine when Cypress trees are burning or like burnt rubber like tyres of a car on a hot day when there is plastic and rubbish in it but it all tastes horrible and it gets into your lungs and burns your throat no matter what type of vegetation is burning..

Once a fire took my dad 3 weeks to put it out and he needed 120 people, 6 red trucks, 8 yellow trucks, 8 personal vehicles, 4 support vehicles, 1 helicopter, 2 planes,                      2 communicator trailers, 3 bulldozers, 2 graders, and two water tankers.  He also needed police, ambulance, local councils, DERM, NP, SES, main road crews, Telstra, Ergon energy, QFS, and RFS. He had to work 27 hours straight then for 14 hours a day and only got a few hours sleep on the bonnet of his work truck while other crews watched the fire.

When putting out a fire you have to think of the weather, topography, humidity, wind speed, temperature, vegetation, and what’s at risk.

Once my dad told me one of his most dangerous moments. He was driving a red truck and the fire was right behind him and he drove up a hill. He reached the top of the road went straight down but he couldn’t see it because of the smoke but he had driven this track before and he knew the road was washed out but he couldn’t back up because the fire was behind him. He had to drive by memory and get through the smoke so he could see and he could easily have fallen of the cliff but he made it safely.

My Dad says what he’s learnt most about fire is that it’s unpredictable, it can be used as a tool and it doesn’t fit into text books because it doesn’t follow rules and he’s been fighting fires since 2002.

Some of the most funniest of stories my Dad has told were once he saw a bandicoot running around on fire and once he was in front of the fire and a fire fighter was behind it and my Dad told the fire fighter that he saw a kangaroo coming right for him but the fire fighter said that he couldn’t see any and then it hit into him and knocked him right over. Also once my Dad was on top of a hill and the fire was at the bottom of the hill and suddenly the wind picked up and the fire went up hill then he turned around and he had his plastic visor on and then the fire reached the top of the hill and went straight up his visor and a fire fighter behind my Dad said all he could see was fire coming out the side of his plastic visor and then ran to get a fire extinguisher but my dad said no don’t get it then he pulled his visor off and patted his face  with his gloves and put it  out . The fire caught my dad’s pants, beard, eyebrows, and nose hairs on fire.  

“Fire deserves your respect it is a living identity just like a human what do we need to survive. Food, heat, and oxygen. A fire needs this to survive but this is what makes it unpredictable because it will hunt for it.” This is a quote by my Dad.

Even though my Dad doesn’t think he’s a hero, I think he is because he saves people’s lives and all the things that are precious to them. The definition of a hero in the dictionary is someone who shows great courage and my Dad does just this.

 “Unconsciously we all have a standard by which we measure other men, and if we examine closely we find that this standard is a very simple one, and is this: we admire them, we envy them, for great qualities we ourselves lack. Hero worship consists in just that. Our heroes are men who do things which we recognize, with regret, and sometimes with a secret shame, that we cannot do. We find not much in ourselves to admire, we always privately want to be like somebody else. If everybody was satisfied with himself, there would be no heroes.”  ― Mark Twain

On Fire

On Fire!

By Gracelyn Laing

 “We are all ordinary. We are all boring. We are all spectacular. We are all shy. We are all bold. We are all heroes. We are all helpless. It just depends on the day.” ―Brad Meltzer. My dad would agree with this quote because he says he’s not a hero, he reckons anyone could be a fire-fighter, they just need the right training and resources.

 I think he is a hero though because he has to deal with dangerous situations all the time. While he was the Team Leader of the State Land Fire Management Unit working for DERM he was driving his work vehicle and the fire was right behind him. He had to drive up a hill to try and escape it. When he reached the top of the road it went straight down but he couldn't see anything because of all the smoke. He had driven this track many times before but he knew the road had washed out since then. He couldn't back up because the fire was right behind him. He had to drive by memory to get through the smoke and he could easily have fallen of the cliff but he made it safely. He said he wasn't scared, he just knew he had to keep driving even though his two other team mates were screaming as he sped across.

A few years earlier while he was working for QFRES he was at the head of the fire in his truck and the fire went straight over the top of him. He said it made a deafening sound kind of like a freight train going passed or the roar of a cyclone heading over you. He said he could hear it easily over all the noise of his crew in the truck with him, the roaring of engine and the loud chattering of the radio above him.

Every fire is a little different according to my dad. Some are so big they can generate their own weather patterns with multiple vortexes. These draw each other to themselves making them look like horizontal cyclones, two to three meters high. Others are like massive layered walls of fire with smoke so thick you can’t breathe and it’s as black as night with a strange orange glow. It gets so hot even from 100 meters away you can still feel the burning heat and it can melt the bottom of your boots and the plastic right off the trucks.

Once my dad took us on a drive around a fire he had put out, it took four hours just to drive around it. It had affected six different communities and he remembered it got up to thirty to forty meters high and stretched for thirty thousand hectares. To put it out, it took one hundred and twenty personal, six red trucks, eight yellow trucks, eight personal vehicles, four support vehicles, one helicopter, two planes, two communication trailers, three bulldozers, two grades, and two water tankers. He also had to get road crews, police, ambulance, Telstra, Ergon energy, SES, DERM, forestry, and National Parkes to help. It took three weeks to put out and he had to work fourteen hours with only a couple hours sleep.

When assessing a fire he has to think about the weather, the humidity, topography, the wind speed, the temperature, the vegetation types and what’s at risk. Priority one is life, priority two property, priority three industry, priority four the environment.

Once he saw a bandicoot running around on fire and it lit up a paddock. There was also a cat that did the same thing but then it ran straight through the cat flap of an old lady’s house and caught that on fire too. The poor lady came running out trying to figure out what had happened to her cat. Another time he saw a kangaroo jump out of the fire and bound straight toward another crew member. Dad radioed to warn him. The fire-fighter looked around but couldn't see anything and the kangaroo bowled him straight over.

My dad has been fighting fires since 2002 and is now the Area Director for QFES in Mackay. He’s also in charge of disaster management like floods, cyclones and industrial fires as well as wild fires. He says they biggest thing he’s learnt about a fire is not to underestimate it. They can be unpredictable and that’s what makes them so dangerous. They can’t be put in a textbook because they don’t follow the rules. But can also be used as a tool.

 “Fire deserves your respect it is a living identity just like a human. What do we need to survive?  Fuel, oxygen, and heat. A fire needs this to survive and once you know this you can control it but this is what makes it so unpredictable because it will hunt for these things.” This is a direct quote from my Dad.

He says the reason he fight fires is for the satisfaction of knowing that he has helped people.

Even though my Dad doesn't think he’s a hero, I think he is because he saves people’s lives and all the things that are precious to them. The definition of a hero in the dictionary is someone who shows great courage and my Dad does just this. “Unconsciously we all have a standard by which we measure other men, and if we examine closely we find that this standard is a very simple one, and is this: we admire them, we envy them, for great qualities we ourselves lack. Hero worship consists in just that. Our heroes are men who do things which we recognize, with regret, and sometimes with a secret shame, that we cannot do. We find not much in ourselves to admire, we always privately want to be like somebody else. If everybody was satisfied with himself, there would be no heroes.”  ― Mark Twain

Laura 2008
Laura and Serair were playing in their neighbours boat which had a hole in it and it started to sink. Accidently they tipped out the ashes of Mc Kelles's dog while they were trying to bale out the water. They felt so guilty they knew they had to say sorry. A long time ago aboriginal children were taken away from their families. In 2008 the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said he was sorry to the aboriginal people for this happening.



Mohammed 1998
Mohammed was excluded from the school cricket team based on racism not his ability till he proved that he was as good as if not better than the boys already on the team.



Lilly 1988
Lilly's cousin from Vietnam comes to live with her. It's the Bicentennial. The class re-enacts the settlement of Australia, dressing up as soldiers and convicts, raising the flag. She tells the story of coming to Australia on a boat and being attacked by pirates. Which turns out to be made up because she's scared about living in a new place where everyone speaks a different language and everything is new.


Mike 1978
Mike's Dad fights in the Vietnamese war. He meets Tippy the man from the dump who has also fought in the war but prefers to be alone rather than make friends. Mike befriends him and lets him know when boys from his class plan on damaging his muscle car.


Sofia 1968
Sofia has just turned ten and is Michaelis's younger sister and he is off fighting in a war at Vietnam. Baba came from Greece and he painted there house blue and says that lots of houses in Greece are this colour.



Michaelis 1958
Michaelis was born in Kalymnos but his parents moved to Sydney because there wasn't much work on there island. Baba used to be a sponge diver but now he drives a taxi and his Mother sews shirts for money and doesn't learn much English.


Jen 1948
Jen is eight and a half and she lives with her Mum, Grandpa and Aunty Bridie and now her new Dad. Her real Dad died in the War before she was born. When her Mum remarried they had a big party and her Uncle Paddy and Uncle Col came over. They got a new green car.


Col 1938
Col is almost eleven. His Ma got pneumonia and died when he was young. His neighbours the Thomsons were evicted because of the depression. The rest of the people in his house are Declan, Bridie, Kath and Jack. Paddy is up country somewhere.



Bridie 1928
Bridie is seven. Her Pa and Mumma left Dublin to find work. Her Pa and two older brothers soon found work at the brick pits in Sydney. The rest of her family is Paddy, Declan, Kathleen and Colin.


Bertie 1918
Bertie was to young to fight in the war so it was his job was to cheer everyone up. He worked hard to save up money to buy his brother a returning home present. His next door neighbour gets a telegram telling her two of her sons had died. He puts on magic show at the hospital where the recovering soldiers need entertaining to earn the last of his money. When his brother returns he has lost his leg and Bertie is devastated because his present is a pair of shoes. His brother is grateful for the present and because he considers himself lucky to be alive.


Evelyn 1908
Evelyn's father buys her a box of fire crackers from China. Evelyn's friend and brother convince her to light one cracker. When it's lit it sends sparks into the rest of the box and they explode. They became afraid of getting punished they try and replace the crackers by making their own.


Rowley 1898
Rowley's Father is away and he thinks if he does 1000 good deeds his father will come home. He delivers fire wood, collects horse manure and runs errands for free. He hears about a meeting who wanted to form a Labour party.


Victoria 1888
It's the centennial, 100 years since settlement. Victoria's father builds a house.


Henry 1878
Henry is an inventor but all his inventions blow up. He blows up the school and is expelled so he has to work with his father in his saddle shop. They invent a possum trap, a cat scarer, a dough mixer and a clothes washer with the help of his best friend Franklin. One day Franklin's sister goes missing and Henry floats a big balloon in the sky so she will see it and know which way is the right way to go home.


Minna 1868
The law changes so that Chinese people are allowed to bring their families to Australia. For the first time Minna sees a photograph and thinks it is a  ghosts or magic. Minna decides to play a tick on her neighbour the Owens by projecting the photograph onto the tent the boys are sleeping in to scare them. As punishment for stealing the projector Minna has to work for Mr Wang.


Ben 1858
Ben's family has travelled from California to Ballarat and Bendigo in search for gold. They have lived in tents. Ben is named after Benjamin Franklin. He goes fishing one day and meets a Chinese boy. He sells the fish to make enough money to buy a turkey for thanksgiving. He also collects  plover eggs to sell. His cat disappears and he is told by some of the adults that the Chinese family have eaten her but he learns eventually that she was safely hiding in the barn. They become friends as they work together to fix a broken clock that had belonged to Mr Owen.


Joana 1848
Joanna wants to find out who her father was. Her mother Alice dies when she was young.


Davey 1838
Davey wanted to be a bushranger but changed his mind after witnessing Mr Owen being shot. He saves Mr Owens by using old Duchess the horse to carry him home.


Alice 1828
A pig race brings out the worst in everyone with cheating on all sides.


Charles 1818
Charles met an escaped convict who was trying to get over the mountains. He got the convict to help him build the fence in exchange for bots and food. Disguise as a Lady he escapes but stops to watch the wedding of Sarah and Sam and almost gets caught.


Sarah 1808

Sarah is a convict girl who is sent to work for the Owens. She meets Sam who also works for the Owens and had to milk the goat, do the gardening and do the repairs. She looks after a girl who is sick with consumption and later dies. She soon becomes friends with the her.


Sam 1798
Sam is a convict boy who was sent to Sydney town.


Dan 1788
The Captain wanted a dog which already belonged to an aboriginal girl called Warrrawi. A young soldier boy named Dan tried to give the girls some sugar, dice, spyglass and a satchel in exchange but she wanted her dog back. Dan took the dog and gave it back to her and was going to be punished by flogging. Warrawi bought a puppy to give to the Captain.


Warawi 1788
Warrawi is surprised to find a cow and white people in boats one day as she is out collecting sticks to make a fire so the smoke can keep the mosquito's away from her Nana. She hears strange noises as they make music.


Aboriginal life before time. Bunda
The brothers were fighting so their dad sets them a series of tasks to get hem to work together. They have to collect water, catch fish and do something that takes the two of them. They decide to catch a possum by smoking it out of the tree it's in. The fire becomes to big and the younger brother has to jump and the older one has to catch him. They both get knocked out and their father gets bitten by a black snake. They stop fighting and work together to suck out the poison, place leaves and mud on the bite to draw out he poison and he recovers.


Aboriginal life before time
The children are fighting and decide who should be in charge based on a series of challenges. The have corrobarie, use indigo plant to stun the fish, use spear to hit a target. One of the younger boys disappears and they have to work together to find him. They are afraid of the cave which makes scary noises which they discover is made by the wombat living there.