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To the rooms where I am dining in the glaring city's day
No, you don't quite get the meaning when the fun is at its height
Yes, you go in with the rest to see your married girl away;
When the women start a-crying, just to show how glad they feel,
You get glimpses through the timber of the lights a-sliding by,
Then the past shows up before you every ghost you thought had fled,
So you pull up at the stable, take the harness off the horse,
But you don't feel much like sleeping with the throbbing in your brain,
Here's the little home you started when your hopes were all aglow;
Here you've been along to-night to see the married girl away,
There were joys your heart was craving, but you never gathered them;
So you sit with eyes wide open, seeing where you've been the fool,
May a fading fancy hover round a gladness that is over?
There's a little house a-peeping o'er the swaying and the sweeping
Let a dying fancy hover round the glories that are over;
Could I hear them as I heard them when the joy of living spurred them,
To no age in all the story of the bearded years and hoary
Come, Little One, and sing to me
Your eyes are clear Australian blue,
What, no Australian song, my child,
You sing the songs of all the earth,
Your poets' eager pens awake
They dress you these in native guise,
What, no Australian song, my dear?
They sing the songs of all the earth,
I've heard the harp the breezes play
I've seen the paddocks all ablaze
I've seen the bright folk riding in
What, no Australian song, my pet?
Yet every exile, wandering lone
You sing the songs of all the earth,
You sing of every land but mine,
Your eyes are clear Australian blue,
Ah, Little One, what dreams would rise
"Wisha, where is he goin' to now
"There's the red heifer's calf in the lane,
"Yer', Old Man, but the head of him's young;
"'Tis that Casey girl now have him caught,
"Don't I mind the old days that are through,
'Twas Callagan who jerked the thumb-
T'wras Mrs. Cooney raised her veil-
'Twas Mac himself who told the yarns
And how he was related.
Tell me, what's a girl to do
Cornered sits each captive lad
One can give you gold galore;
Boundin' heart, and laughin' eye,
~~~ Honeymooning From The Country ~~~
Come the happy honeymooners from the country far away,
Two days old, and very awkward as they wander straight ahead
Much too careful lest the people should suspect them country-bred.
He ha well set-up young fellow; she's a dainty little bride;
And he follows where she leads him with the bush swing in his stride,
Makes himself at home-or tries to-with defiance in his stare,
Thinks he's in the old bush kitchen with his hat beneath the chair.
Every eye is turned upon them, and the kindly smiles that flit
O'er the faces of the diners seem to bless them where they sit;
But for me the past revives with thronging memories in its train,
And I'm thinking that it's Jim and Laughing Mary once again.
Don't I see it all before me? and I feel the mood is good-
There's the horse tied by the sliprails, and a hole worn where he stood;
There's the dreamer riding homewards while the same old fancies throng,
With the same old stars a-staring, and the same old lilting song.
There's the "talkie' matters over," "gettin' all arrangements straight,"
Mum and Dad in the committee for the fixing of the date;
Then the buggies and the linkers at the church upon the hill,
And the ribbons and the garlands, and the flounces and the "frill;"
There's the breakfast down at Mother's-oh, the planning o'er and o'er,
And the murder and the tearing that went on the day before!
Working double shifts and bustling-every female in demand-
Half the women of the parish round to lend a helping hand,
Offering loans to bridge the shortage of the cups and spoons, and then
Tying threads around the handles, so they'll know their own again;
Racing in and out and fussing, so to strike the country dumb;
But they'll talk of Mary's wedding for a score of years to come!
Yes, the breakfast down at Mother's-there's the long, long table spread,
And a houseful of the neighbours with the old priest at their head;
And the speeches-Lord, the speeches-hitting hurdles every stride,
Full of awkward, heartfelt blessings for the bridegroom and the bride;
And the lad himself "respondin'," when the cheers had died away,
Shifting crumbs around the table in the worst speech of the day.
Don't I see it all before me? and my heart and head resent
All the smiles that patronise them, though they may be kindly meant.
"Scent of gum-leaves!" 'Tis a byword in the city's roar and push,
Where they do not know the greatness and the kindness of the bush.
"Scent of gum-leaves," so they whisper. Oh, it sweetens not the air
In the overcrowded city, for the spirit is not there.
Scent of gum-leaves to be scoffed at in the land that gave them birth!
"Scent of gum-leaves"-cease your jargon. 'Tis the finest scent on earth.
Ay, it clung around the Anzacs when they stormed Gallipoli;
And it steeps the nation-builders from the centre to the sea.
Speed the day when all united, heart to heart and hand to hand,
We'll proclaim the scent of gum-leaves to be sacred in the land.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
But my honeymooners leave me, and I watch them passing through-
They are homesick for the freshness of the open spaces, too-
So they gather up their bundles, and they wander home again
Back to where the morning magpies lather out the old refrain,
Back to love in fullest measure, pressed and flowing overtop,
Through the green months and the brown months, in the house behind the crop.
From the overcrowded city, from the bustle and the push
Pass my sturdy, happy couples who are sticking to the bush.
~~~ Making Home ~~~
With the neighbours at the breakfast, and the world is warm and bright;
And it doesn't come upon you when you're driving to the train;
What with wrestling with the luggage, you've no time to feel the pain,
But it grips you like a footpad, making home,
And you feel the sun will never drive the dark away again,
Making home.
There's a mopy feeling round you, and you've nothing much to say;
So you crack a joke to mend things, but you make them worse instead.
Yet the loving words in hundreds are a-running through your head,
Welling from a heart that's melting, making home,
Interrupted by the stabbing of that wretched thing you said,
Making home.
And you rouse upon "herself" a bit to keep the tears to heel,
It's a lot of silly business, and the whole thing gets you beat;
So before you realize it, you are climbing to the seat
Of your buggy, with the missus, making home,
And the old horse clouts the metal with his heavy awkward feet,
Making home.
You can see the red reflection palpitating in the sky;
You can hear the easy puffing as she swings into her stride,
And you feel a sort of pigmy in a world that's cold and wide,
With the wise old stars above you, making home,
While you've got a notion someone is a-sobbing by your side,
Making home.
Everything you did unkindly, every peevish word you said;
And the poor old woman, battling with the tears that blind and ache,
She's been showering love around her all for someone else's sake,
And it starts your mind a-wondering, making home,
Whether what you've been attending was a wedding or a wake,
Making home.
Hit your shins against a bucketÄwell, it does no good, of course.
There's a gloom around the kitchen where the banquet still is spread,
And the cat upon the rocking-chair is sleeping like the dead,
While the ghosts come leering at you, and you're home,
And "herself" she lights the candle, and she goes straight off to bed,
When you're home.
And your heart is on a journey vagabonding with a train;
So you peel the choking collar off, and get out in the cool,
Where you light your pipe and smoke upon the old verandah stool,
Thinking matters slowly over when you're home,
Winding back the skein that somehow's got entangled on the spool,
When you're home.
Them's the currajongs you planted five-and-thirty year ago;
This here sixty-acre paddock was the first you called your own;
That there clearing was a forest, with the timber overgrown.
So you start a-recollecting, when you're home,
Five-and-thirty years have flitted, and you don't know where they've flown,
When you're home.
And you rocked her in her cradleÄwell, it seems but yesterday;
And "herself" you thought she looked so old, and bent and worn with care-
Five-and-thirty slaving winters pile the snows on heart and hair-
And you find that you're an old man, making Home;
And the mile-posts on the road have got behind you unaware,
Making Home.
Fragrant buds that yearned to blossom, but you hacked them from the stem;
Hearts of children, erring sometimes-ah, but golden through and through,
Beating back to where you led them, big with love of home and youl
Now you see them in the distance, making Home,
Like the three red lights you watched to-night receding from your view,
Making home.
Wise with wisdom born of sorrow, smoking, thinking in the cool,
Reckoning him God's new apostle who is busy being kind,
Hearing angel voices chant it in the music of the wind-
Chastened, lonely, and so weary; making Home,
Praying God to pardon what you've been be-cause your eyes were blind,
Making Home.
~~~ Could I Hear The Kookaburras Once Again ~~~
May a dreamer in the silence rake the ashes of the past?
So a spirit might awaken in the best the years have taken,
And the love that left him lonely might be with him at the last.
While he searches in the by-ways, shall his heart forget the highways
Where the sunburnt arms are toiling in the sunshine and the rain,
Where the simple things and lowly make their livessublime and holy,
And the kookaburras chorus once again?
Of the wheat that nods and ripples as the breezes skim its top;
And the days of pioneering in the ringing and the clearing
See the first-born of their labours in the house behind the crop.
There the fallow land is showing where the box and pine were growing,
And a sweet hope gilds the future with the colour of the grain;
Gentle visions softly tripping in the ploughing andthe stripping,
While the kookaburras chorus once again.
Lift a song to sing the present~to the hopeless hope impart-
For above the past's bewailing, golden-writ but unavailing,
Is the simple little ditty that can cheer a drooping heart.
Lift it high for all to hear it. In the Helper's love endear it,
And my ageing heart shall hasten to applaud the sweet refrain;
Yes, I'd feel the pulses stirring to the splendid truth recurring,
Could I hear the kookaburras once again.
When the world was clean and wholesome and they laughed the gloom away,
All the fatal fiction scorning that the canvas of the morning
Is but splashed with faded colours from the brush of yesterday.
Oh, I'd bless them and I'd cheer them, could I wander off and hear them
Boom the head-lights of the coming day that sweep the hills amain,
For I'd know the tocsin sounding of a fuller hope abounding,
Could I hear them hail the dawning once again.
Would I yield the future's promise in the mould of progress cast;
Still, a fading fancy lingers, while the touch of gentle fingers
Moves aside the sombre curtain that was drawn across the past.
Come the fairy visions winging, come the laughter and the singing,
But the shadows fall around me and the echo dies in pain;
Yet I'd feel the wings that bore me when the world was all before me,
Could I hear the kookaburras once again.
~~~ Come, Sing Australian Songs To Me ~~~
A song our big wide land to bless,
Around whose gentle parent-knee
We've twined the flowers of kindliness.
Your voice like soft bush breezes blown;
Her sunshine steeps the heart of you,
Your tresses are the wattle's own.
No lay of love, no hymn of praise?
And yet no mother ever smiled
With our dear country's winsome ways:
Of bower and bloom and bird and bee; And
has the land that gave you birth
No haunting, native melody ?
The world-old themes of love and youth,
The pulse of life, the joy, the ache,
The pregnant line of earnest truth;
And interweave with loving hand
The freshness of your rain-washed skies,
The colours of your sunlit land.
And yet I've heard the cottage ring
With notes the world would pause to hear,
When at their work your sisters sing.
Of tender sky, and dimpling sea,
But all their strains have not the worth
Of one Australian song, for me.
Among the wilding wilga-trees;
I've swept my world of care away
When bush birds lift their melodies:
When spring in golden glory comes,
The purple hills of summer days,
The autumn ochres through the gums:
O'er blooms that deck the clovered plain,
And neath the trees, when moonbeams spin
Their silver-dappled counterpane.
No patriot note on native horn,
To bind the hearts in kindness met,
And link the leaf Australian-born?
Our happy careless homes among,
May live the best his heart has known
Whene'er his country's songs are sung.
Of alien flower and alien tree:
But no one, in my grief or mirth,
Will sing Australian songs to me.
Where life is lilting neath the sun,
Still all its spirit seems ashine
In you, my little laughing one.
Your face is towards the future set;
The bounding, gladsome heart of you
Is hers-and only hers, my pet.
If, nestled here upon my knee,
You'd flash those soft Australian eyes,
And sing your country's songs to me!
~~~ Moryah ~~~
With the hat on the back of the poll,
And the hair of him curled on the brow,
Like a millionaire out for a stroll?"
"Ar', Old Man, but he's yardin' the cow."
"Moryah!
With the hat on the back of his poll?
And the grey mare is mad for a bite,
And the dog up above on the chain
Is shoutin' and bawlin' all night."
"Sure, Old Man, you're keownrawnin' again."
"Moryah!
And that Jim gallivantin' the night?"
And the chubby gossoon with the dart
Have the wits of him straightened and strung
To the tune of the song in the heart,
With the lilt of it there on the tongue."
"Moryah-
And bad luck from the song in the heart!
And her mother out baking the bread;
It is there she should be, so she ought,
With the eyes dancing jigs in her head;
Faith, when I was a boy, sure we thought . . ."
"Moryah!
'Twas yourself had an eye in the head.
When a boy and a colleen afar
Felt the bound and the hurt of it too
As they swung in a dream on a star-
Thiggim-thu, my Old Man, thiggim-thu ?"
"Ouisha,
Poor old woman, 'tis dreamin' you are."
~~~ A Stranger in the Church ~~~
A mute, interrogating thumb-
That set the people staring
At Gasey's lot arriving late.
They had in tow a fashion-plate
In tailored garments up-to-date,
And patent leathers wearing.
From heel to collar shining new
His hair was like a poet's, too),
He went and sat in Casey's pew,
His lofty manners airing.
A handsome, netted, spotted veil-
To mop the perspiration;
And while she mopped, she took the chance
To shoot one sly enquiring glance
(Which trivial happy circumstance
Escaped his observation).
And McEvoy, he stole a look,
The while he gravely moved the book,
And certain useful bearings took
To help the situation.
An unauthenticated yarn-
While after Mass we waited,
Of bank account, and purse, and pelf
("But, faith, he was a pagan elf-
I never seen him bless himself
Nor read his book," Mac stated).
So there and then we made a bid
To find his secret where 'twas hid;
We found out what his father did,
'Twas brother Jim made up his mind-
A calculating, jealous mind-
That "that there toff" was courting.
He saw him smile when Mary spoke,
He watched him help with Mary's cloak,
And drive away with Mary's folk,
At Mary's side disporting.
And Mary looked so coy and trim-
At least it seemed that way to Jim-
And this it was that rattled him,
Each trifle misreporting.
~~~ Tell Me, What's A Girl To Do? ~~~
When the gossoons court and cozen?
Some have none and some have two,
More can count a baker's dozen.
Mary, Mary, by and by,
With the woman in you wakin',
Boundin' heart and laughin' eye,
There'll be murder, no mistakin'.
Gazin' vacant at the rafter,
Talkin' wisdom with your dad-
Faith, it isn't him they're after.
Wisha, Mary, there you be
'Neat and sweet and fair and fetchin',
Heart-whole still and fancy-free!
Yer', Acushla, but 'tis ketchin'.
Life with gilded gauds he'd smother.
One can give you something more,
Love, that ne'er can love another.
In the twinklin' sunlight walkin'
Love, you tell me, passes by-
Wisha, Mary, don't be talkin'.
Copyright 1996-2001 - KRACKATINNI IS THE REGISTERED TRADEMARK OF RODNEY JOHN O'BRIEN