An Anthology of Australian Verse Part 3

I see in a vision a woman like her Trip down an orchard slope, With rosy prattlers that shout a name In tones of rapture and hope; While the yeoman, gazing at children and wife, Thanks G.o.d for the pride and joy of his life.

Whose conscience is heavy with this dark guilt?

Who pays at the final day For a wasted body, a murdered soul, And how shall he answer, I say, For her outlawed years, her early doom, And despair -- despair -- beyond the tomb?

Adam Lindsay Gordon.

A Dedication

They are rhymes rudely strung with intent less Of sound than of words, In lands where bright blossoms are scentless, And songless bright birds; Where, with fire and fierce drought on her tresses, Insatiable summer oppresses Sere woodlands and sad wildernesses, And faint flocks and herds.

Where in dreariest days, when all dews end, And all winds are warm, Wild Winter's large flood-gates are loosen'd, And floods, freed from storm, From broken-up fountain heads, dash on Dry deserts with long pent up pa.s.sion -- Here rhyme was first framed without fas.h.i.+on -- Song shaped without form.

Whence gather'd? -- The locust's glad chirrup May furnish a stave; The ring of a rowel and stirrup, The wash of a wave; The chaunt of the marsh frog in rushes, That chimes through the pauses and hushes Of nightfall, the torrent that gushes, The tempests that rave;

In the deep'ning of dawn, when it dapples The dusk of the sky, With streaks like the redd'ning of apples, The ripening of rye.

To eastward, when cl.u.s.ter by cl.u.s.ter, Dim stars and dull planets, that muster, Wax wan in a world of white l.u.s.tre That spreads far and high;

In the gathering of night gloom o'erhead, in The still silent change, All fire-flush'd when forest trees redden On slopes of the range.

When the gnarl'd, knotted trunks Eucalyptian Seem carved, like weird columns Egyptian, With curious device, quaint inscription, And hieroglyph strange;

In the Spring, when the wattle gold trembles 'Twixt shadow and s.h.i.+ne, When each dew-laden air draught resembles A long draught of wine; When the sky-line's blue burnish'd resistance Makes deeper the dreamiest distance, Some song in all hearts hath existence, -- Such songs have been mine.

Thora's Song

We severed in Autumn early, Ere the earth was torn by the plough; The wheat and the oats and the barley Are ripe for the harvest now.

We sunder'd one misty morning Ere the hills were dimm'd by the rain; Through the flowers those hills adorning -- Thou comest not back again.

My heart is heavy and weary With the weight of a weary soul; The mid-day glare grows dreary, And dreary the midnight scroll.

The corn-stalks sigh for the sickle, 'Neath the load of their golden grain; I sigh for a mate more fickle -- Thou comest not back again.

The warm sun riseth and setteth, The night bringeth moistening dew, But the soul that longeth forgetteth The warmth and the moisture too.

In the hot sun rising and setting There is naught save feverish pain; There are tears in the night-dews wetting -- Thou comest not back again.

Thy voice in my ear still mingles With the voices of whisp'ring trees, Thy kiss on my cheek still tingles At each kiss of the summer breeze.

While dreams of the past are thronging For substance of shades in vain, I am waiting, watching and longing -- Thou comest not back again.

Waiting and watching ever, Longing and lingering yet; Leaves rustle and corn-stalks quiver, Winds murmur and waters fret.

No answer they bring, no greeting, No speech, save that sad refrain, Nor voice, save an echo repeating -- He cometh not back again.

The Sick Stock-rider

Hold hard, Ned! Lift me down once more, and lay me in the shade.

Old man, you've had your work cut out to guide Both horses, and to hold me in the saddle when I swayed, All through the hot, slow, sleepy, silent ride.

The dawn at "Moorabinda" was a mist rack dull and dense, The sun-rise was a sullen, sluggish lamp; I was dozing in the gateway at Arbuthnot's bound'ry fence, I was dreaming on the Limestone cattle camp.

We crossed the creek at Carricksford, and sharply through the haze, And suddenly the sun shot flaming forth; To southward lay "Katawa", with the sand peaks all ablaze, And the flushed fields of Glen Lomond lay to north.

Now westward winds the bridle-path that leads to Lindisfarm, And yonder looms the double-headed Bluff; From the far side of the first hill, when the skies are clear and calm, You can see Sylvester's woolshed fair enough.

Five miles we used to call it from our homestead to the place Where the big tree spans the roadway like an arch; 'Twas here we ran the dingo down that gave us such a chase Eight years ago -- or was it nine? -- last March.

'Twas merry in the glowing morn among the gleaming gra.s.s, To wander as we've wandered many a mile, And blow the cool tobacco cloud, and watch the white wreaths pa.s.s, Sitting loosely in the saddle all the while.

'Twas merry 'mid the blackwoods, when we spied the station roofs, To wheel the wild scrub cattle at the yard, With a running fire of stock whips and a fiery run of hoofs; Oh! the hardest day was never then too hard!

Aye! we had a glorious gallop after "Starlight" and his gang, When they bolted from Sylvester's on the flat; How the sun-dried reed-beds crackled, how the flint-strewn ranges rang, To the strokes of "Mountaineer" and "Acrobat".

Hard behind them in the timber, harder still across the heath, Close beside them through the tea-tree scrub we dash'd; And the golden-tinted fern leaves, how they rustled underneath; And the honeysuckle osiers, how they crash'd!

We led the hunt throughout, Ned, on the chestnut and the grey, And the troopers were three hundred yards behind, While we emptied our six-shooters on the bushrangers at bay, In the creek with stunted box-trees for a blind!

There you grappled with the leader, man to man, and horse to horse, And you roll'd together when the chestnut rear'd; He blazed away and missed you in that shallow water-course -- A narrow shave -- his powder singed your beard!

In these hours when life is ebbing, how those days when life was young Come back to us; how clearly I recall Even the yarns Jack Hall invented, and the songs Jem Roper sung; And where are now Jem Roper and Jack Hall?

Ay! nearly all our comrades of the old colonial school, Our ancient boon companions, Ned, are gone; Hard livers for the most part, somewhat reckless as a rule, It seems that you and I are left alone.

There was Hughes, who got in trouble through that business with the cards, It matters little what became of him; But a steer ripp'd up Macpherson in the Cooraminta yards, And Sullivan was drown'd at Sink-or-swim; And Mostyn -- poor Frank Mostyn -- died at last, a fearful wreck, In the "horrors" at the Upper Wandinong, And Carisbrooke, the rider, at the Horsefall broke his neck; Faith! the wonder was he saved his neck so long!

Ah! those days and nights we squandered at the Logans' in the glen -- The Logans, man and wife, have long been dead.

Elsie's tallest girl seems taller than your little Elsie then; And Ethel is a woman grown and wed.

I've had my share of pastime, and I've done my share of toil, And life is short -- the longest life a span; I care not now to tarry for the corn or for the oil, Or for wine that maketh glad the heart of man.

For good undone, and gifts misspent, and resolutions vain, 'Tis somewhat late to trouble. This I know -- I should live the same life over, if I had to live again; And the chances are I go where most men go.

The deep blue skies wax dusky, and the tall green trees grow dim, The sward beneath me seems to heave and fall; And sickly, smoky shadows through the sleepy sunlight swim, And on the very sun's face weave their pall.

Let me slumber in the hollow where the wattle blossoms wave, With never stone or rail to fence my bed; Should the st.u.r.dy station children pull the bush-flowers on my grave, I may chance to hear them romping overhead.

I don't suppose I shall though, for I feel like sleeping sound, That sleep, they say, is doubtful. True; but yet At least it makes no difference to the dead man underground What the living men remember or forget.

Enigmas that perplex us in the world's unequal strife, The future may ignore or may reveal; Yet some, as weak as water, Ned, to make the best of life, Have been to face the worst as true as steel.

Henry Kendall.

Prefatory Sonnets

I.

I purposed once to take my pen and write, Not songs, like some, tormented and awry With pa.s.sion, but a cunning harmony Of words and music caught from glen and height, And lucid colours born of woodland light And s.h.i.+ning places where the sea-streams lie.

But this was when the heat of youth glowed white, And since I've put the faded purpose by.

I have no faultless fruits to offer you Who read this book; but certain syllables Herein are borrowed from unfooted dells And secret hollows dear to noontide dew; And these at least, though far between and few, May catch the sense like subtle forest spells.