Bougainville

Tags

Arawa, Australian bush poetry, Australian traditional poetry, Bougainville Copper Limited, Bougainville Island, Bougainville War, Panguna, poem, poetry

So quick to strike are the seeds of war
And the harvest reaped is bitter.
An emerald jewel with a fatal flaw,
For a speck of hatred lay at its core
For the progress made and the rule of law
When the treasure had lost its glitter.

How many of you in your graves lie dead?
How many lives were shattered?
The coral sands now stained with red,
And the villages flaming as you fled
From the smothering smoke as your country bled –
To the four winds you were scattered.

The mine in the mountains gone to waste
And the towns where we lived all burned.
Repent at leisure for deeds in haste
For rebellion’s cup is with poison laced
As men go mad as your blood they taste
And too late is the lesson learned.

Where are you John, and Ambrose too?
Did you survive this madness?
And Bilou and Tioni, are they with you?
Tell me, who are left of our old crew?
Though I have asked, none said, none knew;
Seems all that’s left is sadness.

And what of the island I first saw
With the Crown Prince Range enshrouded
With cloud that turned to the smoke of war
As the future burned and the bullets tore –
Can it be plucked from the devil’s maw?
Is its fate forever clouded?

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This Day

Tags

ANZAC Day, Australian bush poetry, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Formal poetry, poem, poetry, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet

The soldiers, those who’ve died, moulder away
Beneath their gravestones – flesh and bones don’t last.
Their souls perhaps look down upon this day
And see the flags that flutter at half-mast;
The thinning ranks so proudly marching past –
With many from the rear, now at the fore.
The souls of all the soldiers who have passed
Away – just yesterday, and all before:
The dead who died at home, and those at war.
Perhaps they all gaze on – each mother’s son,
Remembering the smoke, the cannon’s roar,
The corpses in the trenches overrun.
They won our freedom, and they bore the cost;
And none know better – how it can be lost.

Drought & Flood

Tags

Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, drought, Flood, Formal poetry, poem, poetry, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet

Drought

The paddocks bake to brown in summer heat.
The river shrinks to holes where lungfish dwell.
The grass remaining cracks beneath one’s feet.
The water level drops deep in the well,
And everywhere is death, and death the smell,
For scattered on the ground the rotting dead.
A blasted vision of an earthly hell,
Where walk the living with their limbs like lead,
Beneath a sky bloodshot at dusk with red.
The wind stirs dust; the tree limbs crack and fall.
The ants and maggots thrive – they are well-fed.
A crow upon a carcass sounds its call.
The land is dying – drying is its blood;
Its thirst will not be quenched – until the flood.

Flood

The land has languished in the drought’s foul grip,
But now the clouds roll in and soon the rain
Falls lightly, and the downpipes start to drip.
Then steadier, like an approaching train
it’s heavier, that welcome sweet refrain
As gutters gurgle and tanks overflow,
And raindrops drum against the window pane.
The rain turns to torrential – warm winds blow.
The fresh creeps higher in the stream below.
The river’s banks are broken, comes the flood.
Across the flats the surging waters flow
To wash away drought’s sacrificial blood.
The gods appeased – the cycle is complete.
Now throbs the land once more to its slow beat.

Unmarked

Tags

Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Gayndah cemetery, poem, poetry, Queensland drovers, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet, Two-up, Unmarked graves

I’ve walked this graveyard; I know you are here,
But I can’t find a headstone or a cross.
And you can’t give a sign when I am near,
So maybe I’ll just take two coins and toss
Them high, and where they land there’ll be no moss-
Encrusted stone – just a bare patch of earth
That I’ll call yours, and it will mark our loss.
Of grander monuments there is no dearth,
But their inscriptions are of little worth.
The elements erode each written word;
Time blurs the name, the date of death, and birth.
I never knew you. Of your life I’d heard.
My father learned the truth, but much too late.
I came to find you – sorry for the wait.

{In memory of Felix Thomas O’Brien – drover, 1895 – 1963}

{Photo of Gayndah Cemetery by Ruth P}

Shaggy Ridge

Tags

7th Div AIF, Battle of Shaggy Ridge, Bird of Paradise, Crater Hill, Finisterre Range, Green Sniper's Pimple, Japanese 78th Infantry Regiment, Japanese mountain gun, John's Knoll, Kankiryo Saddle, New Guinea, Ramu Valley Campaign, Surinam River New Guinea, The Pimple, Trevor's Knoll, World War 2

“The Pimple” was the name they gave
This blasted peak – this lofty grave.
I stand where kunai grass grows tall;
I’m careful lest I slip and fall.
How could men on this summit fight?
How could they scale this soaring height
Whilst from its top, from mountain guns,
Poured out the wrath of Nippon’s sons?

The jungle’s grown back on one side
And on the other old scars hide
Beneath the grass; it clothes the graves,
As with the wind it weeps and waves.
But in my mind armed men I see;
A soldier’s voice, it speaks to me –
My father’s words, the lost years bridge,
Here on the spine of Shaggy Ridge.

Five hundred Japanese sleep here
And fifty diggers slumber near.
I wonder – was it worth the price?
I spy a Bird of Paradise.

{In memory of the men of the 7th Division, Australian Imperial Force, and the Battle of Shaggy Ridge, October 1943, and of Allen Noel O’Brien Sgt 7th Div AIF}

The Mountain Ash

Tags

Australian bush poetry, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Eucalyptus regnans, mountain ash, poem, poetry, Tasmania

Reaching for the skies,
Unfeeling, deaf, and blind.
Knowing not of life or care
Or that it is, or when or why it dies,
While those around it, of its kind,
The same indifference wear.

No greater living thing
And yet none less concerned.
Just there for others to admire;
Those on the earth and wing.
To stand until it’s burned
To ash, uncaring, in a forest fire.

The mountain ash (Eucalyptus regnans) is the tallest flowering plant
in the world reaching heights of 330 feet or more.
It is second only to the redwood as the tallest tree

Noosa Forest on a Wet Afternoon

Tags

Australian poet, Latrodectus hasseltii, Noosa Heads, Noosa Private Hospital, Noosa Queensland, poem, poetry, Redback spider, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet, Widow spiders

{During a short stay at Noosa Hospital}

On fallen leaves the falling raindrops splash.
The undergrowth is green, it glistens wet.
The ocean’s waves, I hear their muffled crash
On distant rocks and beach. A spider’s net
Shines like a silver brooch with diamonds set –
A beaded web where insects fear to tread.
Reclining at its centre, black as jet,
Except for that alluring flash of red
Upon her back – the spider in her bed;
While round her glint the hollowed husks of prey.
The rain keeps falling from a sky of lead.
On high the lorikeets on branches play.
I head back to my room – it’s getting late.
The redback beckons to her tiny mate.

Where did my Dingo Ringo Go?

Tags

Australian poet, Meryl Streep, poem, poetry, Queensland drovers, Song lyrics, The Overlander song

Where did my dingo go?
His name, my friend, was Ringo!
Now I’m feeling mighty low!
For a baby ate my dingo!

{To the tune of the chorus of “The Overlander”}

Iconic Ned

Tags

Australian bush poetry, Australian traditional poetry, Bushrangers, Kelly Gang, Ned Kelly, Ned Kelly the Australian icon, poem, poetry

The fashion – to revere the ones who lose,
And elevate them to a higher place.
Their bitterness with victimhood replace.
Their critics, of class prejudice accuse.

Forgotten, those whose courage won success,
Or else their reputations smeared and mired,
While Kelly and his gang are much admired
By many in the media and press.

It’s true we have a bushranger icon.
A bitter youth who chose to rob and kill.
To terrorize and force men to his will,
And finally a suit of iron to don

When all his crazy plans had come undone
And innocents lay dead around his feet.
Was then his immortality complete –
Transformed by myth, by class and by the gun,
From murderer to celebrated son.

Scrub Turkeys

Tags

Australian bush poetry, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, Megapode, Mound builder, poem, poetry, Scrub Turkey

Of all bush structures, none can best
The grandeur of the turkey’s nest –
A mighty tower of twigs and leaves,
With claw and beak, each turkey weaves;
An oven, where the cock’s strong feet,
About the eggs, adjust the heat,
Until the chicks with chirp and cheep
Burst skywards from the rotting heap.