Age

Tags

Aging, Bird song, poem, poetry

𝐀𝐠𝐞

Oh to be a bird at dawn,

Knowing not when it was born.

Sings its song as if its first.

By no memories accursed.

Lives each day as if its last.

Doesn’t count the seasons past.

Cleverer than any sage —

Has no wish to know its age.

— D.N. O’Brien

Homo sapiens 2

Tags

Australian poet, Homo sapiens, poem, poetry

𝑯𝒐𝒎𝒐 𝒔𝒂𝒑𝒊𝒆𝒏𝒔 2

Before the Earth is burned to ash,
Before the stars and planets crash,
The dinosaurs will rule again;
In time will disappear, and then
Will dawn once more the era when
Will rise the worriers — wise men.

— D.N. O’Brien

The Last Day

Tags

poem, poetry, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐋𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐃𝐚𝐲

I worked with a man who was young and smart;
He was honest too, as the day is long.
Forty years ago did our paths then part,
And I thought forever, but I was wrong.
When I’d last known him he was straight and strong,
But the man I met on the year’s last day,
To my memories he did not belong:
He was bowed and bent and his hair was grey,
And he said as I shook his hand: “G’day”
In a feeble voice, (Oh his hand was cold),
And he gazed at me in the strangest way,
And he softly said: “Well you have grown old.”

So we reminisced, then said our goodbyes,
And he shuffled off — with his two good eyes.

— D.N. O’Brien

Day and Night

Tags

Australian poet, poem, poetry

𝐃𝐚𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐍𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭

Fiercely, the fire, did the strong day stoke,
And up to the sky billowed flames and smoke;
But then came the night and the fire grew old —
Where it once burned bright, now its ash lay cold.

— D.N. O’Brien

The Inselberg

Tags

Ayre's Rock, Central Australia, Inselberg, poem, poetry

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐈𝐧𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐛𝐞𝐫𝐠

I am a rock surrounded by a plain

Swept by the desert winds — a little rain

Falls on me — down my flanks it flows like tears.

I’ve rested on this plain a million years.

About me there is little mystery:

I once was sand beneath a sparkling sea —

I turned to rock, I hardened into stone,

Then by gigantic force I rose alone;

Was thrust upward while all else sank below;

But all of that is now so long ago.

Came lately creatures made of flesh and bone,

Then men who killed them with my brother stone.

To them my body was of little worth,

For little lived upon my hardened earth.

Came then the men who climbed upon my back;

But they no longer tread that well-worn track.

It seems the first ones now claim me as theirs —

The first one to the prize — with none he shares.

But I care not what mere men lose or gain;

I have a heart of stone — I feel no pain.

— D.N. O’Brien

23 Weeks

Tags

Abortion in Australia, Australian poet, poem, poetry, Triolet

𝟐𝟑 𝐖𝐞𝐞𝐤𝐬

It’s 3 and 20 weeks I’m aiming for;
If I can live till then I may survive.
To not end up discarded blood and gore,
It’s 3 and 20 weeks I’m aiming for.
I’m hiding in my bunker — this is war,
And I’ll be lucky to emerge alive.
It’s 3 and 20 weeks I’m aiming for;
If I can live till then I may survive.

— D.N. O’Brien

No questions asked abortion up to 22 weeks

Sonnet for a Tree

Tags

Australian axemen, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bloodwood tree, Corymbia gummifera, Formal poetry, poem, poetry, Red Bloodwood tree, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet, Split posts, Tree felling

𝐒𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐭 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐚 𝐓𝐫𝐞𝐞

Upon a hill there stood a bloodwood tree;
A mighty tree — limbs spread against the sky.
That bloodwood from its crown looked down on me,
As I would gaze upon a feeble fly.
No danger did it see — surely not I
Could threaten it, could bring it to the ground.
And so the tree dismissed me with a sigh —
A rustling of its leaves — a mournful sound.
Its trunk, it was three yards at least around,
For it was old — but I was young and so
My thoughts were of its use when it was downed;
I had a fence to build, a crop to grow.
And many posts from that great log I’d split.
My axe was razor-sharp, and deep it bit.

— D.N. O’Brien

Taboo

Tags

Ancient man, australian aboriginal, Australian Aboriginal laws, Australian bush poetry, Australian poet, poem, poetry, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet, Stone age man, Taboo, totems and taboos, Tribal societies

Taboo

You ask me, how on earth did he survive
For many centuries? Well here’s a clue:
For more than needed, never did he strive.
His little wealth he carried, his needs few.
He stuck to the old ways and nothing new
Would he allow. So for thousands of years
He didn’t change — for change it was taboo.
Paralysis by superstitious fears —
This saved him. Round the fire at night wise seers
Would tell the dreamtime myths — his history,
Unquestioned by his trusting eyes and ears.
And thus did he remain fearful, not free.
Bound tight by rigid rules that would not bend,
His world would stay unchanged — else it would end.

— D.N. O’Brien

Leaving Gondwana

Tags

australia, Australian poet, Centrifugal Force, Continental Drift, Gondwana, Gondwanaland, poem, poetry, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet

Leaving Gondwana

Now all alone, north-east it slowly drifts.
Just inch by inch the mighty mass it slides.
An island of gigantic size — it shifts,
As on its shores now beat the timeless tides.
Upon a sea of molten rock it glides;
It slips — it’s driven by a starry force —
An engine that within its body hides,
Propelling it far from its primal source.
It journeys on a strange uncharted course,
Escaping from its motherland; its home
Now far behind, yet it feels no remorse —
Young continents, like children, tend to roam.
No trail it leaves; there is no wake to west.
It never tires, and never will it rest.

— D.N. O’Brien

A Universal Question

Tags

Agnosticism, Atheism, Australian poet, Creation of the Universe, God, poem, poetry, Science and the universe, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet

𝐀 𝐔𝐧𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐚𝐥 𝐐𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧

We sit upon a whirling tilted sphere,
That hurtles through a vacuum at high speed.
And if you don’t think this is rather queer,
You are my friend, a strange fellow indeed.
The Sun (an atom bomb) it is agreed,
We circle once a year. A satellite,
The moon we call it — like a silver bead,
It shines upon us on a moonlit night.
The stars above on starry nights give light,
And shooting stars sometimes at night they fall,
And though they are to us a splendid sight,
They’re meteors — not really stars at all.
Who set in motion this great cosmic dance?
Or could it all have happened just by chance?

— D.N. O’Brien