The Fremantle Press Anthology of Western Australian Poetry
Page 7
— Yours truly,
Humanitas.
To His Excellency the Governor.
To you, our generous ruler,
I come with this appeal,
On behalf of those, my people,
Whose wants I keenly feel.
I approach you with submission,
Turn not your face away;
But listen to a care-worn chief
Whose locks are turning gray.
Our ranks are quickly thinning,
It grieves me to look round;
I see that in a few short years
Our place will not be found.
Where are those countless numbers
That once were blithe and gay?
Where are our wives and children?
Ah! tell me where are they?
The white man came amongst us,
He proved a faithless seer, —
He introduced tobacco,
He plied our sons with beer.
He drove away the kangaroo,
Our hunting grounds laid waste,
And sadly now we miss that food,
So suited to our taste.
The winter has come round again,
The nights are chill and cold;
It is not for the strong I ask,
’Tis for the weak and old.
We cannot now find bookas,
Our little ones to swathe;
I therefore ask for clothing,
’Tis blankets that I crave.
Oh grant me this petition,
Turn not from me away;
And I your faithful servant
For ever more will pray.
Bungert
Chief of the Vasse Tribe.
Published 30 July 1873.
Henry Charles Prinsep (b.1844 d.1922)
Josephine
J ust at the hour when dusky twilight fades,
O n me the dearest eyes of love incline,
S erenely calm above the darkling shades
E ach peeping star on my delight doth shine.
P indaric ode or Spenser’s flowing line
H as not the voice to sing the joys I mean;
I ne’er can tell how sweet a lot is mine,
N o words for me can ever paint the scene,
E nchanted, I can utter naught but Josephine.
Acaster (n.d.)
O’er a Native’s Grave
Poor child of earth – The rising sun,
That tips the hills with mellow ray,
No more shal’t rouse thee from thy sleep,
Or cheer thee on thy lonely way.
No more with spear, and weapons rude,
Shal’t thou roam thro’ the woodland dell,
No more midst festive scenes shall sing
The wildsome songs you loved so well.
Here must thou sleep, the sleep of death,
For earth has claimed the earth she gave,
And thou must rest a briefsome space
Within this lone sequestered grave.
The tree which bends its head o’er thine,
Is better far than marble stone,
The birds will chant their sweetest lay
Around thy first and only home.
Dark was thy line, but who shall say,
‘Thy heart was blacker than is mine!’
At the last dread day who can tell,
Thy face, shall not with glory shine.
Published 16 July 1881.
Alfred Chandler (‘Spinifex’) (b.1852 d.1941)
The Poet
He burnt the spice
Of paradise
Within a golden bowl,
And from the swinging censer broke
The sumptuous smoke
That softly stole
In blue perfumes
Among the altars dim,
And steeped his soul
In incense of the Seraphim;
For it was won
From poppy blooms
That grew in valleys of the sun
What time he heard
The mellow bird
Awake with radiant ecstasy
The morning’s stars in Heaven’s sky,
And from the night
Drew dividends of rare delight,
Until it seemed his very soul
Was floating from the golden bowl.
Lights Along the Mile
The night descends in glory, and adown the purple west
The young moon, like a crescent skiff, upon some fairy quest,
Has dropped below the opal lights that linger low and far
To havens that are beaconed by the Pilot’s evening star;
And slowly, softly, from above the darkness is unfurled
A wondrous curtain loosened on the windows of the world.
Then suddenly, like magic, where smoke-stacks fumed the while,
Ten thousand lights flash out aflame along the Golden Mile.
And thro’ the dusky gauze that falls upon the looming mines
Dim spires and spars of poppet heads in faintly broken lines
Grow clearer to the vision, till the shadow picture seems
The argosies from half the world i’ the misty Port o’ Dreams;
And lo! where golden Day had reigned in radiant robes of blue,
A god of joy and hope, who thrilled the sons of toil and rue,
Now comes the Queen of Starland forth to scatter with a smile
Her diamonds that flash and blaze along the Golden Mile.
And all the night a thousand stamps in ceaseless rhythm roar
Are beating out the tragic gold from endless streams of ore,
These harnessed giants of the will that so are trained and taught
To answer to the sentient touch and catch the thrill of thought,
From nerve to nerve that quivers thro’ the animated steel,
And makes it live and makes it move and strength emotions feel,
Till in their voices music comes insistent all the while
Reverberating massive chants along the Golden Mile.
And down below, a thousand feet, a thousand miners tear
The golden ore, the glistening ore that holds such joy and care;
Ah! down below, another world, with hopes, desires and dreams —
Such playthings as the tyrant Fate in fickle will beseems.
Ah! down below where panting drills are eating thro’ the rock,
Where life and death are lurking in the fire’s convulsive shock, —
Where many a sturdy hero delves within the lode’s long aisle
To win him love, the gold of love, along the Golden Mile.
Now speeding westward flies the train into the wondrous night,
The engine pulsing as a man who strives with strenuous might;
Its great heart seems to throb and throb, its breath comes fierce and warm
To vitalize the force that sleeps along its sinuous form;
So dreaming back from Somerville, a sad thought fills the air,
And starts a poignant fancy o’er the wondrous city where
From Lamington to Ivanhoe there’s many a tear and smile
Beneath the myriad lights that gleam along the Golden Mile.
How bright they glitter down the streets o’er camp and mill, and mine,
The reflex of that mystic stream that flows from dark to shine —
The brother of that rival spark that wakes from mystery,
And grows to life and will and power and human entity;
The confluent currents of the mind that holds us all in fief,
And gives to some the thrill of joy, to some the pang of grief —
Ah! many noble deeds are done and many that are vile
Where love is lost and love is won, along the Golden Mile.
So midnight chimes across the gloom, as we are speeding west,
And sirens screech the respite sweet that ends in sleep and rest;
The cool breeze meets the tired
brow and whispers gentler tales
That seem to murmur with the metre sung by wheels and rails.
The night has grown in glory and from out the purple dome
Ten thousand stars are gleaming to show the wanderer home;
While fainter fades the glimmer, like a city on an isle,
Till swallowed in the darkness are the lights along the Mile.
Coolgardie 1893
The western night is cool and sweet after the burning day,
And faintly clang the camel bells; in echoes, far away;
For lo! the wind is hushed as tho’ the hollows held their breath,
In the sudden solemn silence of the mediator, Death.
Ah! the horror of the hollows,
Where a demon lurks and follows
The bitter fight for gold,
Ah! the hideous embraces,
And the pain on beaten faces
That I have withered in his hold.
A-down the flats and thro’ the bush the camp fires flicker bright;
The shadows looming darkly from the glimmer of the light;
Where spectre men ’neath spectre trees are met to bivouac
The pilots of a legion that is eager on their track.
Of an army coming, coming,
On their panning dishes drumming
With a tump-a-tump-tum;
And across the sand plains singing,
To the roll-up that is ringing,
Where the siren whispers ‘Come!’
The balsam of the spicewood burning, fills the stilly air,
Like some cathedral incense that has floated everywhere;
While starry lights upon the heavenly altar shine,
And angels kneel to worship, and men are made divine.
Are the brave before the altar,
They whose love could never falter.
For the loving left behind.
Hark! the memory of voices
That inspire us and rejoice us.
From the spaces hope enshrined.
A dusky gauze that’s woven from the twilight’s deep’ning shades,
Has fallen o’er the distant verge, and settles in the glades;
A gossamer that hides the harshness of a cruel face,
And softens into beauty all the terrors of the place.
Like the wondrous weft that covers
The golden dreams of lovers,
In the sunrise litten years.
Or the gentle smile that hideth,
All the sorrow that abideth,
In the ache of unshed tears.
But lo! from out the silent gloom, there comes a dulcet din,
A soft allegro rippling from a merry mandolin;
And o’er the strings it dances in a musical tirade,
Or suddenly it changes to a lover’s serenade.
Ah! the tenderness and longing,
Put in pink-a-pink-a-ponging,
And the strength of love confess’d,
For a lady who is thinking,
As she sees the star-eyes blinking
O’er the farness of the West.
And list’ning to the trembling trills, the pink-a-pank-a-pink.
We only want to dream and dream, and never want to think;
The way the player lullaboos, in stilly darkness hid,
The grief of ‘Swanee River’ or the spell of ‘Old Madrid’ —
What a vision of romances,
With the castanets and dances,
And the casements and guitars!
Yet here in soul comparing,
There is chivalry and daring
Beneath the southern stars.
So lying on the cooling sands, and dreaming to the sky,
We hear the stillness broken by a tinkly lullaby;
And all the world’s a hollow, with a single joy therein,
That is quiv’ring in the music of the magi’s mandolin.
For our fears and foes are banished,
And our weariness has vanished,
With a pink-a-pink-a-pong.
And in fancies that are thronging,
All our loves, our lives, our longing
Are concerted in a song.
But, hush! the charm is ended, and in slumberland released.
We’ll wander ere the flaming eye is glaring in the East;
When we must strike the outer pads, that lead where peril hides,
And stake our lives and longing and, all the world besides.
Ah! the world is wide for roaming,
Yet the rovers will be homing,
Like the doves when night is nigh.
But they’ll dream of golden trammels
And the mandolins and camels,
And the singer’s lullaby.
Mary Doyle (‘May Kidson’) (b.1858 d.1942)
Perth in Morning Light
O! heavenly sweet the pearly morn,
With the still river fast asleep,
And all the youngling day unborn,
While fleecy clouds like flocks of sheep
Are straying by the raying east
And dawn makes ready for her feast,
The trees that fringe the river bank
Lie, too, beneath the crystal tide
As ’twere some fairy artist sank
A perfect etching that defied
The river (as it laps and dips)
Unsmeared by the wet fingertips,
The Hills white veiled seemed bent in prayer,
Such little hills to climb so high,
Half circling in their garden care
The City ’neath the leaning sky,
And still by bank and bole runs on
The river in the rising sun,
Nearby a Mill wan with the years,
And quaintly old is proud to stand
The legacy of pioneers
Sure of the future of the land —
A precious monument apart
Of virile men, of lion heart …
The river passes by the town
A mimic sea in morning calm;
Above a greening crest looks down
Beyond the circle of its arm,
Where cressets of the red gum blaze
And wattle lights her golden rays,
There King’s Park keeps her bushland still
(That every wilding flower dyes)
To frolic free by dale and hill.
And just below the City lies,
Where the smoke spirals, grey and blue,
Curl on the new day breaking through.
The town hall spire that is our pride,
Delicate, poised against the sky
The City’s mist doth override
And round it homing pigeons fly.
I stand a moment then apart
And seem to hear a people’s heart.
Aye! well I know that dreams come true
When hand and heart and brain create
The larger vision coming through,
When strong souls serve and serving wait
The newer day that shall be born,
In the sun of another morn …
The placid river bears along
The freighted barges from the sea.
Singing afresh some matin song
Of days that were and days to be,
And when the breeze and river meet
The salt foam sprays the City’s feet;
By Blackwall Reach and Crawley Bay,
On the Swan River’s silvery breast
I’ve seen her white winged feet at play …
This stilly morning of the West
I sail my skiff of memories
Adown the river to the seas.
It’s New Year morn, alone, aloud,
Cathedral chimes are floating by;
Thoughts like to prayer about me crowd,
And all the silence underlie
That a fine people find their goal,
With heart steel-true and striving soul.
Joh
n Philip Bourke (‘Bluebush’) (b.1860 d.1914)
When I am Dead
When I am dead
Bring me no roses white,
Nor lilies spotless
And immaculate,
But from the garden roses red,
Roses full blown
And by the noon sun kissed,
Bring me the roses
That my life has missed
When I am dead.
Percy Henn (b.1865 d.1955)
A Soldier’s Funeral
Slowly, slowly, along the street they come;
Horses and men, and men and horses — so,
With boom of drum and rattle of kettle drum,
Marching, marching, with solemn step and slow.
The horses shake their manes, their bridles jingle:
The men march on in silence with bowed head;
And here in crowds, and there alone and single
Men watch, and wait the passing of the dead.
Afar the gleam of steel, a flash of light:
And now a skirl of pipes the wind gusts blow,
Like antic ghosts at revel in the night
Mocking the misery of human woe.
They come, they pass, and like a dream, are not,
Fading in dust of earth about them thrown:
Far off the sudden crack of rifle shot,
The call to rest and peace on bugles blown.
Charles Wiltens Andrée Hayward (b.1866 d.1950)
Belinda
’Twas an unpretentious grog-shop in a dusty mining centre,
Flanked about with empty bottles that were growing more and more.
People called it the ‘Excelsior’, but ‘Abandon hope who enter’,
Would have been a fitter legend for the board above the door.
Alexander was the landlord — Mr. Patrick Alexander —
Strangers mostly called him Alec., but his boon companions Pat.;
And his usual coign of vantage was a broken-down verandah,
Where the township’s hardest cases sprawled and swore and smoked and spat.
Then a local paper’s par spread one morn the news afar
That an angel in a bodice had appeared behind the bar;