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The Poet’s Will

The bush bard to the war has gone,
And hence, in endless lays,
Some properties that fitly shone
He’s willed to Olden Days.

The old bark hut that stood for long
A landmark on the rise;
The wattle bloom and billabong,
The boobook grave and wise;

The dying stockman (sadly missed!),
The curlew’s lonely cry,
The sliprails where the poet kissed
A phantom girl good-bye;

The stockyard gate where cattle push,
And whence lean horsemen turn
To ride away through silent bush
Where campfires ever burn;

The mopoke that when night descends
Salutes his brother owl;
The horse bells tinkling in the bends,
The dingo’s dismal howl;

The stockwhip swinging ‘cross the plains,
And thundering down the Bland;
The quartpot and the hobble chains,
Also the station brand;

The packhorse jogging through the rack,
Where Western drovers go,
The blokes who blazed the thirsty track
Ahead of Cobb and Co.;

The coo-ee that came ringing far
Whence wilting grasses wave;
The wail in sheoak and belar
Above the swagman’s grave;

A shanty damsel, plump and fair,
In old Bill’s bullock dray;
A gleaming woolshed and a pair
Of bowyangs soiled with clay;

A lost soul cast ‘mid thirst and sand;
The digger’s Christmas cheer;
Some melancholy aspects and
A barrelful of beer.

All these are left to Yesterday;
The bard is on the track
Of newer things a world away—
I wish that he were back.

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