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PIONEERS
We are the Old-world people,
Ours were the hearts to dare;
But our youth is spent, and our backs are bent,
And the snow is in our hair.
Back in the early fifties,
Dim through the mists of years,
By the bush-grown strand of a wild, strange land,
We entered - the pioneers.
Our axes rang in the woodlands,
Where the gaudy bush-birds flew,
And we turned the loam of our newfound home,
Where the Eucalyptus grew.
Housed in the rough log shanty,
Camped in the leaking tent,
From sea to view of the mountains blue
Where the eager diggers went.
We wrought with a will unceasing,
We moulded, and fashioned, and planned
And we fought with the black and we blazed the track
That ye might inherit the land.
There are your shops and churches,
Your cities of stucco and smoke;
And the swift trains fly where the wild cat’s cry
O’er the sad bush silence broke.
Take now the fruit of our labour,
Nourish and guard it with care;
For our youth is spent, and our backs are bent
And the snow is in our hair.
Frank Hudson
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THE WHITE RIBBON
“It’s quiet now…so still, my dear; the dogs are restless, though.
I think a storm is very near, they somehow always know.”
He knocks his pipe against the hearth and rubs his aching head.
“I think I’ll have a nice hot bath before I go to bed.”
He hears a sound outside the door, a whimper in the night,
and limps across the old stone floor towards the fading light.
The dog is there, sprawled on its side; he hears its laboured breath
and knows his mate, so long his pride, is very close to death.
“G’day old friend.” He settles back against the hand-sawn logs,
and says a prayer for One-Eyed Jack, the king of all his dogs.
He reaches out and runs his hand along Jack’s heaving flanks.
“The pain will go, please understand…for that I must give thanks.”
Beyond the red gums by the creek a blaze of red on high
becomes a pink and orange streak as sunset lights the sky.
He smiles. “It’s one of ours, my love, remember how we sat
that night when sunset flamed above, and talked of this and that.
I saw you at the local dance, the Town and Country Ball,
and didn’t give myself a chance of meeting you at all.
And yet you came and said hello, I felt I walked on air;
you held my hand and seemed to know the things that we could share.
You smelled of musk, I can’t forget; that perfume haunts me still,
and though it’s decades since we met, I know it always will.”
He feels the dog stir at his feet and senses in its pain
the final moments of retreat, a battle fought in vain.
“Don’t wait around, please go, old friend, you should be on your way;
it comes to all of us, the end…and you have had your day.
I’d like to help to set you free, to do what I should do,
but I’m a coward, don’t you see, it must be up to you.”
Despite himself, the word is there, the source of all his shame;
it hovers in the still night air with memories of blame.
For now it all comes flooding back, the years just fall away,
and she is standing on the track, like it was yesterday.
She’s in that dress, as white as milk, and nestling in her hair
the matching ribbon, purest silk, he’d given her to wear.
But something’s wrong, her eyes so blue now shine with angry tears:
“You don’t mean that…say it’s not true. I can’t believe my ears!”
He gasps in shock and reaches out; she knocks away his hand,
and then he pleads, now sick with doubt: “Please try to understand…
I simply don’t believe in war, I’ve really thought it through,
and killing men, whatever for, is something I can’t do.”
But as he speaks he knows he’s lost, and yet his voice goes on,
refusing to accept the cost, to say that hope has gone.
“I’ve bought some land…for you and I…out there past Ten Mile Creek;
it’s where we always said we’d buy, the future we would seek.
I want to build a home for us, the timber’s fine out there.
I never thought you’d make a fuss…it’s more than I can bear!”
He hears her voice, as cold as ice, a tone he’s never heard,
and now he has to pay the price, struck down by each harsh word.
“I see the truth, it’s very clear…I don’t care what you thought…
you’re just a coward, full of fear, and not the man I sought.
I thought I loved you; I was wrong. If you won’t go and fight
then you and I just don’t belong…it simply isn’t right!”
She stares a moment, then she turns, a gesture of disgust;
the fury in her eyes still burns, and down there in the dust
he sees the ribbon, white as snow, contemptuously tossed.
While he just stands to watch her go and mourn for all he’s lost.
And now he sits, as dreams unfold, outside the house he built,
and feels again that hurt of old, the agony of guilt.
“You didn’t stop, or turn around, or give me any chance;
you walked away without a sound, without a backward glance.
How could you simply leave behind the love that we had shared?
And how could I have been so blind, completely unprepared?
I thought you knew and understood the way I looked at life,
would welcome that, and think it good, and say you’d be my wife.
But I was wrong, to my regret, it seems the die was cast,
and fate decreed the night we met our love could never last.”
He wipes away a silent tear, then feels a sudden chill;
beneath his hand, so very near, old Jack is lying still.
“Well done, my friend, you knew the way, you sensed your time was nigh;
you called me here to sit and pray, to say my last goodbye.
I only wish we all could choose when it was time to go,
that very moment when we lose the hopes we cherish so.
I guess we’re all of afraid of death; we cling to what might be…
the dream that drives each daily breath, a future we can see.”
As sunset casts a final gleam he sighs and slowly stands,
then from his pocket takes the dream and holds it in his hands.
The band of silk is soft to touch, it soothes his fingertips.
He says “I miss you dear, so much,” and lifts it to his lips.
Her smiling face is all he sees as twilight turns to dusk,
and from afar, borne on the breeze, there’s just a hint of musk.
© 2009 - David Campbell
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Relief of Mildura
Doctors had run out of whisky, and our stock of liquor was spent,
Save one poor half dozen of lager that belonged to the Rechabite tent;
And the sky was as brass above us, and the land was fevered with drought,
And we wandered with blistered gullets, and tongues that were hanging out.
And ever the Murray to temp us, at the edge of the sun-cracked flat;
But no, we were men of Mildura – we hadn’t come down to that.
But daily the torture lasted, and daily the horror grew
Of the thought that we dare not utter – the thing that all of us knew.
Someone must try the water, must yield to the fatal law,
So we shared in that devil’s gamble-and mine was the shortest straw.
One moment of human weakness-then I stepped to the river’s brink;
It was flowing before me-water-and I was condemned to drink.
And then, oh was it an angel, or that daft lass, Jessie Brown,
Cried “Dinna ye sniff the reek o’t-the pipes of Echuca town?”
And louder and ever louder, and near and nearer the while,
We heard the beat of her paddles, the rescuing steamboat Nile.
With her bar-doors breathing a blessing, on her mission of mercy she came,
And the sunlight blazed on the bottles in a halo of living flame.
And “Courage,” the skipper shouted, as he moored to the blighted scrub,
“There’s forty tons of liquor aboard, consigned to the local club.”
Then madly rushed through our being the warm red current of life;
We didn’t wait for a corkscrew-we hanked off the heads with a knife.
And the brass bank burst into music, and the temperance banners waved,
And we saw three stars in the evening sky, and we knew that Mildura was saved.
Davidson Symmons
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A BUSH CHRISTMAS
The sun burns hotly thro' the gums
As down the road old Rogan comes --
The hatter from the lonely hut
Beside the track to Woollybutt.
He likes to spend his Christmas with us here.
He says a man gets sort of strange
Living alone without a change,
Gets sort of settled in his way;
And so he comes each Christmas day
To share a bite of tucker and a beer.
Dad and the boys have nought to do,
Except a stray odd job or two.
Along the fence or in the yard,
"It ain't a day for workin' hard."
Says Dad. "One day a year don't matter much."
And then dishevelled, hot and red,
Mum, thro' the doorway puts her head
And says, "This Christmas cooking, My!
The sun's near fit for cooking by."
Upon her word she never did see such.
"Your fault," says Dad, "you know it is.
Plum puddin'! on a day like this,
And roasted turkeys! Spare me days,
I can't get over women's ways.
In climates such as this the thing's all wrong.
A bit of cold corned beef an' bread
Would do us very well instead."
Then Rogan said, "You're right; it's hot.
It makes a feller drink a lot."
And Dad gets up and says, "Well, come along."
The dinner's served -- full bite and sup.
"Come on," says Mum, "Now all sit up."
The meal takes on a festive air;
And even father eats his share
And passes up his plate to have some more.
He laughs and says it's Christmas time,
"That's cookin', Mum. The stuffin's prime."
But Rogan pauses once to praise,
Then eats as tho' he'd starved for days.
And pitches turkey bones outside the door.
The sun burns hotly thro' the gums,
The chirping of the locusts comes
Across the paddocks, parched and grey.
"Whew!" wheezes Father. "What a day!"
And sheds his vest. For coats no man had need.
Then Rogan shoves his plate aside
And sighs, as sated men have sighed,
At many boards in many climes
On many other Christmas times.
"By gum!" he says, "That was a slap-up feed!"
Then, with his black pipe well alight,
Old Rogan brings the kids delight
By telling o'er again his yarns
Of Christmas tide 'mid English barns
When he was, long ago, a farmer's boy.
His old eyes glisten as he sees
Half glimpses of old memories,
Of whitened fields and winter snows,
And yuletide logs and mistletoes,
And all that half-forgotten, hallowed joy.
The children listen, mouths agape,
And see a land with no escape
For biting cold and snow and frost --
A land to all earth's brightness lost,
A strange and freakish Christmas land to them.
But Rogan, with his dim old eyes
Grown far away and strangely wise
Talks on; and pauses but to ask
"Ain't there a drop more in that cask?"
And father nods; but Mother says "Ahem!"
The sun slants redly thro' the gums
As quietly the evening comes,
And Rogan gets his old grey mare,
That matches well his own grey hair,
And rides away into the setting sun.
"Ah, well," says Dad. "I got to say
I never spent a lazier day.
We ought to get that top fence wired."
"My!" sighs poor Mum. "But I am tired!
An' all that washing up still to be done."
"C.J. Dennis"
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One about my home town,
The Coachman's Yarn by E. J. Brady
This is a tale that the coachman told,
As he flicked the flies from Marigold
And flattered and fondled Pharaoh.
The sun swung low in the western skies;
Out on a plain, just over a rise,
Stood Nimitybell, on Monaro;
Cold as charity, cold as Hell,
Bleak, bare, barren Nimitybell --
Nimitybell on Monaro.
"Now this 'ere 'appened in eighty-three,
The coldest winter ever we see;
Strewth, it was cold, as cold as could be
Out 'ere on Monaro:
It froze the blankets, it froze the fleas,
It froze the sap in the blinkin' trees.
I made a grindstone out of cheese,
Right 'ere in Monaro!
"Freezin' an' snowin' -- ask the old hands
They seen, they knows, an' they understand
The ploughs was froze, and the cattle brands,
Down 'ere in Monaro:
It froze our fingers and froze our toes:
I seen a passenger's breath so froze
Icicles 'ung from 'is bloomin' nose
Long as the tail on Pharaoh!
"I ketched a curlew down by the creek;
His feet was froze to his blessed beak;
'E stayed like that for over a week --
That's cold on Monaro.
Why, even the air got froze that tight
You'd 'ear the awfullest sounds at night,
When things was put to a fire or light,
Out 'ere on Monaro.
"For the sounds was froze. At Haydon's Bog
A cove 'e crosscut a big back-log,
An' carted 'er 'ome ('e wants to jog --
Stiddy, go stiddy there, Pharaoh!).
As soon as his log begins to thaw
They 'ears the sound of the crosscut saw
A-thawin' out. Yes, his name was Law.
Old hands, them Laws, on Monaro.
"The second week of this 'ere cold snap
I'm drivin' the coach. A Sydney chap,
'E strikes this part o' the bloomin' map,
A new hand 'ere on Monaro:
'Is name or game I never heard tell,
But 'e gets of at Nimitybell;
Blowin' like Bluey, freezin' like 'ell,
At Nimitybell on Monaro.
"The drinks was froze, o' course, in the bar:
They breaks a bottle of old Three Star,
An' the barman sezs, 'Now, there y' are,
You can't beat that for Monaro!'
The stranger bloke, 'e was tall an' thin,
Sez 'Strike me blue, but I think you win;
We'll 'ave another an' I'll turn in --
It's blitherin' cold on Monaro.'
"'E borrowed a book an' went to bed
To read awhile, so the missus said,
By the candle-light. 'E must ha' read
(These nights is long on Monaro)
Past closin' time. Then 'e starts an' blows
The candle out: but the wick 'ad froze!
Leastways, that's what folks round 'ere suppose
Old hands as lived on Monaro.
"So bein' tired, an' a stranger, new
To these mountain ways, they think he threw
'Is coat on the wick; an' maybe, too,
Any odd clothes 'e'd to spare. Oh,
This ain't no fairy, an' don't you fret!
Next day came warmer, an' set in wet --
There's some out 'ere as can mind it yet,
The real old 'ands on Monaro.
"The wick must ha' thawed. The fire began
At breakfast time. The neighbors all ran
To save the pub`.....an' forgot the man
(Stiddy, go stiddy there, mare-oh).
The pub was burned to the blanky ground;
'Is buttons was all they ever found.
The blinkin' cow, 'e owed me a pound --
From Cooma his blinkin' fare, oh!
"That ain't no fairy, not what I've told;
l'm gettin' shaky an' growin' old,
An' I hope I never again see cold,
Like that down 'ere 'on Monaro!"
He drives his horses, he drives them well,
And this is the tale he loves to tell
Nearing the town of Nimitybell,
Nimitybell on Monaro.
First published in The Bulletin, 20 April 1922
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A RAIN SONG
There is music in the Mallee,
Lilting music, soft and low,
Like the songs in vale and valley
Where the summer waters flow;
But an anthem of elation
Wedded to a woman’s mouth
Is the message from each station
From the Mitchell River south.
For it’s raining! raining! raining!
How the iron roof tops ring!
How the waters, swiftly draining
Through the straining down pipes sing!
Every drop a golden rhyme is,
Every shower a stanza strong,
And each day of raining time is
Canto sweet of God’s great song.
Oh, the earth was dry as tinder,
And her lips were cracked with pain!
From the south to Thargominda
Like a dead thing she has lain;
But, at last, the long drought broken,
She - like lazarus, the Jew,
When the Christ words had been spoken -
She shall leap to life anew.
For it’s raining! raining! raining!
Don’t you hear the merry din?
Don’t you hear the old earth straining
As she sucks the juices in?
And the swelling creeks and rivers -
Hark! their mellow madrigal!
Oh, the sweetest music givers
Are the autumn rains that fall!
All the air is sweet with voices,
Sweet with human voices now;
And the anvil-tool rejoices
On the ploughshare and the plough;
Yes, above the joyous beating
Of the roof bass you can hear
All the choirs of nature meeting
In an anthem loud and clear.
For it’s raining! raining! raining!
Over all the thirsty land!
Don’t you hear the old earth straining
As the sapless roots expand?
But her famine days are over,
And her smiles shall soon be seen,
For her old-time Autumn lover
Brings her back her garb of green.
E. S. Emmerson
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CLANCY OF THE OVERFLOW - A.B. "Banjo" Paterson
I had written him a letter which I had, for want of better
Knowledge, sent to where I met him down the Lachlan, years ago,
He was shearing when I knew him, so I sent the letter to him,
Just "on spec", addressed as follows: "Clancy, of The Overflow".
And an answer came directed in a writing unexpected,
(And I think the same was written in a thumbnail dipped in tar)
'Twas his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it:
"Clancy's gone to Queensland droving, and we don't know where he are."
In my wild erratic fancy visions come to me of Clancy
Gone a-droving "down the Cooper" where the western drovers go;
As the stock are slowly stringing, Clancy rides behind them singing,
For the drover's life has pleasures that the townsfolk never know.
And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him
In the murmur of the breezes and the river on its bars,
And he sees the vision splendid of the sunlit plains extended,
And at night the wondrous glory of the everlasting stars.
I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy
Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall,
And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city
Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all.
And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle
Of the tramways and the buses making hurry down the street,
And the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting,
Comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet.
And the hurrying people daunt me, and their pallid faces haunt me
As they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous haste,
With their eager eyes and greedy, and their stunted forms and weedy,
For townsfolk have no time to grow, they have no time to waste.
And I somehow fancy that I'd like to change with Clancy,
Like to take a turn at droving where the seasons come and go,
While he faced the round eternal of the cashbook and the journal -
But I doubt he'd suit the office, Clancy, of "The Overflow".
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Bob, you've done it again old son. That would have to be one of my favourite poems. The way it flows could almost be sung to tune,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Keep them coming boys,,,,,,,,,,,
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SAID HANRAHAN
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
In accents most forlorn,
Outside the church, ere Mass began,
One frosty Sunday morn.
The congregation stood about,
Coat-collars to the ears,
And talked of stock, and crops, and drought,
As it had done for years.
"It's lookin' crook," said Daniel Croke;
"Bedad, it's cruke, me lad,
For never since the banks went broke
Has seasons been so bad."
"It's dry, all right," said young O'Neil,
With which astute remark
He squatted down upon his heel
And chewed a piece of bark.
And so around the chorus ran
"It's keepin' dry, no doubt."
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out.
"The crops are done; ye'll have your work
To save one bag of grain;
From here way out to Back-o'-Bourke
They're singin' out for rain.
"They're singin' out for rain," he said,
"And all the tanks are dry."
The congregation scratched its head,
And gazed around the sky.
"There won't be grass, in any case,
Enough to feed an ass;
There's not a blade on Casey's place
As I came down to Mass."
"If rain don't come this month," said Dan,
And cleared his throat to speak--
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"If rain don't come this week."
A heavy silence seemed to steal
On all at this remark;
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed a piece of bark.
"We want a inch of rain, we do,"
O'Neil observed at last;
But Croke "maintained" we wanted two
To put the danger past.
"If we don't get three inches, man,
Or four to break this drought,
We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."
In God's good time down came the rain;
And all the afternoon
On iron roof and window-pane
It drummed a homely tune.
And through the night it pattered still,
And lightsome, gladsome elves
On dripping spout and window-sill
Kept talking to themselves.
It pelted, pelted all day long,
A-singing at its work,
Till every heart took up the song
Way out to Back-o'Bourke.
And every creek a banker ran,
And dams filled overtop;
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"If this rain doesn't stop."
And stop it did, in God's good time;
And spring came in to fold
A mantle o'er the hills sublime
Of green and pink and gold.
And days went by on dancing feet,
With harvest-hopes immense,
And laughing eyes beheld the wheat
Nid-nodding o'er the fence.
And, oh, the smiles on every face,
As happy lad and lass
Through grass knee-deep on Casey's place
Went riding down to Mass.
While round the church in clothes genteel
Discoursed the men of mark,
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed his piece of bark.
"There'll be bush-fires for sure, me man,
There will, without a doubt;
We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."
John O'Brien
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Now Bob's retired he will have plenty of time to put some original compositions up here.
