60 Classic Australian Poems for Children (4 page)

We have Telephones and Cables

And Electric Telegraph,

To flash the news to any point

In a minute and a half.

To sum it up what way you will,

It's anything but slow;

It seems a vast improvement

On the days of Cobb & Co.

We have Electric trams and Cable trams

The Motor and the Bike;

You can get about the country now

At any speed you like.

We have railways to the backblocks,

Where the iron horses go;

And yet the times were better

In the days of Cobb & Co.

There was enterprise and money,

And any amount of work;

There was wool and fat stock rolling in

From the Mitchell Plains and

Bourke.

There was merchandise and

passengers

To carry to and fro:

There was life too,

in Australia,

In the days of

Cobb & Co.

To travel out a thousand miles

You'd book yourself in town;

They'd guarantee to pull you through,

When you paid your money down.

They travelled then by rough bush tracks,

Through mountains, bog and snow;

And deliver you well up to time

Would good old Cobb & Co.

They had some splendid drivers,

Who could handle horses neat,

To see them work their ribbons on

Those bush tracks was a treat.

And they'd get a change of coaches

Every twenty miles or so;

And they drove some slashing cattle,

In the days of Cobb & Co.

Our progress has been rapid,

But the days are poorer now,

Than the days of Jimmy Tyson, and

Good old Jacky Dow.

I remember well the sixties,

And transit then was slow:

But give to me the golden days,

The days of Cobb & Co.

The Days of Cobb & Co. and other verses
, 1906

Scrape the bottom of the hole, gather up the stuff,

Fossick in the crannies, lest you leave a grain behind.

Just another shovelful and that'll be enough,

Now we'll take it to the bank and see what we can find,

Give the dish a twirl around,

Let the water swirl around,

Gently let it circulate, there's music in the swish,

And the tinkle of the gravel,

As the pebbles quickly travel

Around in merry circles on the bottom of the dish.

Ah, if man could only wash his life, if he only could,

Panning off the evil deeds, keeping but the good,

What a mighty lot of digger's dishes would be sold,

Tho' I fear the heap of tailings would be greater than the gold,

Give the dish a twirl around,

Let the water swirl around,

Man's the sport of circumstance however he may wish,

Fortune, are you there now?

Answer to my prayer now,

Drop a half-ounce nugget in the bottom of the dish.

Gently let the water lap, keep the corners dry,

That's about the place the gold'll generally stay,

What was that bright particle that just then caught my eye?

I fear me by the look of things 'twas only yellow clay,

Just another twirl around,

Let the water swirl around,

That's the way we rob the river of its golden fish,

What's that? can't we snare a one?

Don't say that there's ne'er a one,

Bah, there's not a colour in the bottom of the dish!

The Bulletin
, 1891

The ocean heaves around us still

With long and measured swell,

The autumn gales our canvas fill,

Our ship rides smooth and well.

The broad Atlantic's bed of foam

Still breaks against our prow;

I shed no tears at quitting home,

Nor will I shed them now!

Against the bulwarks on the poop

I lean, and watch the sun

Behind the red horizon stoop—

His race is nearly run.

Those waves will never quench his light,

O'er which they seem to close,

To-morrow he will rise as bright

As he this morning rose.

How brightly gleams the orb of day

Across the trackless sea!

How lightly dance the waves that play

Like dolphins in our lee!

The restless waters seem to say,

In smothered tones to me,

How many thousand miles away

My native land must be!

Speak, Ocean! is my Home the same,

Now all is new to me?—

The tropic sky's resplendent flame,

The vast expanse of sea?

Does all around her, yet unchanged,

The well-known aspect wear?

Oh! can the leagues that I have ranged

Have made no difference there?

This version notes that this poem was written ‘in a lady's album' by ALG while he was sailing to Australia.

How vivid Recollection's hand

Recalls the scene once more!

I see the same tall poplars stand

Beside the garden door;

I see the bird-cage hanging still;

And where my sister set

The flowers in the window-sill—

Can they be living yet?

Let woman's nature cherish grief,

I rarely heave a sigh

Before emotion takes relief

In listless apathy;

While from my pipe the vapours curl

Towards the evening sky,

And 'neath my feet the billows whirl

In dull monotony!

The sky still wears the crimson streak

Of Sol's departing ray,

Some briny drops are on my cheek,

'Tis but the salt sea spray!

Then let our barque the ocean roam,

Our keel the billows plough;

I shed no tears at quitting home,

Nor will I shed them now!

Poems of Adam Lindsay Gordon
, 1913

Australia's a big country

An' Freedom's humping bluey,

An' Freedom's on the wallaby

Oh! don't you hear 'er cooey?

She's just begun to boomerang,

She'll knock the tyrants silly,

She's goin' to light another fire

And boil another billy.

Our fathers toiled for bitter bread

While loafers thrived beside 'em,

But food to eat and clothes to wear,

Their native land denied 'em.

An' so they left their native land

In spite of their devotion,

An' so they come, or if they stole,

Were sent across the ocean.

Then Freedom couldn't stand the glare

O' Royalty's regalia,

She left the loafers where they were,

An' came out to Australia.

But now across the mighty main

The chains have come ter bind her,

She little thought to see again

The wrongs she left behind her.

Our parents toiled to make a home,

Hard grubbin' 'twas an' clearin',

They wasn't crowded much with lords

When they was pioneerin'.

But now that we have made the land

A garden full of promise,

Old Greed must crook 'is dirty hand

And come ter take it from us.

This poem was written for
The Worker
, the monthly official journal of the Federated Workers of Queensland.

So we must fly a rebel flag,

As others did before us,

And we must sing a rebel song

And join in rebel chorus.

We'll make the tyrants feel the sting

O' those that they would throttle;

They needn't say the fault is ours

If blood should stain the wattle!

The Worker
, 1891

The Emus formed a football team

Up Walgett way;

Their dark-brown sweaters were a dream

But kangaroos would sit and scream

To watch them play.

‘Now, butterfingers,' they would call,

And such-like names;

The emus couldn't hold the ball

—They had no hands—but hands aren't all

In football games.

A match against the kangaroos

They played one day.

The kangaroos were forced to choose

Some wallabies and wallaroos

That played in grey.

The rules that in the West prevail

Would shock the town;

For when a kangaroo set sail

An emu jumped upon his tail

And fetched him down.

A whistler duck as referee

Was not admired.

He whistled so incessantly

The teams rebelled, and up a tree

He soon retired.

The old marsupial captain said,

‘It's do or die!'

So down the ground like fire he fled

And leaped above an emu's head

And scored a try.

Then shouting, ‘Keep it on the toes!'

The emus came.

Fierce as the flooded Bogan flows

They laid their foemen out in rows

And saved the game.

On native pear and Darling pea

They dined that night:

But one man was an absentee:

The whistler duck—their referee—

Had taken flight.

The Animals Noah Forgot
, 1933