Nana’s Words

Tags

Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, Formal poetry, poem, poetry, World War 2

𝐍𝐚𝐧𝐚’𝐬 𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐬

My grandmother, when very old,
These things to me she quietly told:
“Your father, of my sons the third,
From him you’ll never hear a word
Of certain deeds performed in war;
And so, before I die, I swore
To tell you what he’ll keep from all —
What I was told — what some recall.
Your father was a thoughtful lad;
Inclined to muse and sometimes sad.
No innocents the boy destroyed,
And confrontation he’d avoid.
He showed no liking for the fight —
He’d rather dream — to read and write.
And yet when cruel war raised its head,
His brothers to the fray he led.
And but for him, they now confide,
In foreign lands they would have died.

So this, to you, his son, I say,
Just take his mother’s words away:
In some men courage is concealed,
Till by necessity revealed —
It is the pounding of the guns
That winnows out the bravest ones.”

— D.N. O’Brien

The Rescue of baby Mary Jane Meehan

Tags

Australian Aboriginals, Australian Outback, Australian pioneers, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, cattle and sheep stations, Formal poetry, Helen Montgomery, Mary Jane Meehan, Moree New South Wales, poem, poetry, Rosewood Mungindi

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐮𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐛𝐚𝐛𝐲 𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐉𝐚𝐧𝐞 𝐌𝐞𝐞𝐡𝐚𝐧

On the 16th of December 1886 in the “Big Leather Watercourse” area of the Gwydir River, west of Moree in New South Wales, a woman, Mary Jane Meehan (nee Heydon), died soon after giving birth to a baby girl. It appears that she and her 3 year old son Edward were living in the bush, no doubt in a makeshift dwelling, while her husband, Timothy Edward Meehan, was away working, probably droving. Tragically, Mary Jane’s mother, Mary Jane Heydon (born in Whittingham, Hunter River, NSW in 1849) had died giving birth to her.

It was summer, but the children were apparently found by local aboriginals and presumably looked after by them until they were found by Helen Montgomery, a grazier’s wife, and taken to their property “Rosewood” near Mungindi. The child was later christened Mary Jane. It’s not known how long the children were in the care of the Montgomerys, or when they were reunited with their father, but when Mary Jane married Queensland drover Frank Epstead Green in Moree in 1904, she gave her residence as “Rosewood, Mungindi”.

Mary Jane and Frank Epstead Green went on to have 16 children. The family lived on properties throughout western Queensland but spent later years at Tulga station and other locations near Longreach. Both died in Darra, Brisbane — Frank in 1957 and Mary Jane in 1975.

Mary Jane was the Grandmother of my wife Helen O’Brien (nee Green).

𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐉𝐚𝐧𝐞

Here’s a story I’ll tell of Australia’s outback:
Out west of Moree there’s a tumbled down shack
Where died a young woman a long time ago —
Some still talk about it, the few left who know.
And though details vary, most of them agree
She was heavy with child; had a young boy of three.
Her husband away, just the odd friendly black
Would sometimes pass by on a lonely bush track.
One day, as it happened, a new baby cried,
And a little boy clung to the mother who’d died.
She’d told little Edward, whilst words she could give,
That the blacks he must find, for the baby must live.
And the little boy found them and quickly they came
And rescued the baby, and her mother’s name,
With that she was christened. A story of pain,
Of death, and the rescue of babe Mary Jane.

{𝘐𝘯 𝘮𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘺 𝘰𝘧 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘺 𝘑𝘢𝘯𝘦 𝘔𝘦𝘦𝘩𝘢𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘺 𝘑𝘢𝘯𝘦 𝘔𝘦𝘦𝘩𝘢𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘭𝘥,
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘮𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘺 𝘸𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘏𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘯 𝘖’𝘉𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯}

— D.N. O’Brien

The Rescuer

The natives saved them, she then took them in —
The newborn baby and her little brother.
She cared for them, though they were not her kin,
But helpless little waifs who’d lost their mother.
The girl when she grew up and then was married,
Put “Rosewood, Mungindi” as whence she came;
For in her heart those memories she carried —
Her gratitude burned like an endless flame.
Now as she said her vows the rescuer —
The one who’d acted selflessly that day,
Though there in spirit, could not smile for her;
Five years had passed since she had passed away.

{In honour of Mrs. Helen Montgomery, “Rosewood” Mungindi, died 1899,
RIP}

— D.N. O’Brien

Incorrigible

Tags

Australian convicts, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, Cat of nine tails, Formal poetry, Incorrigible convicts, poem, poetry, sonnet, Spenserian sonnet, Van Diemen's Land

𝐈𝐧𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞

He heads for hell beneath the surging sails;
One soul of tens of thousands bound in ships
East-driven by the roaring forties gales.
His gruel consumed, a brackish brew he sips —
Stares at the deck, and licks his leathered lips.
Sad hopeless thoughts beat in his beaten brain,
As with cold calloused hands his head he grips.
Perhaps he stole a pound of precious grain,
A handkerchief, a coin, a rich man’s cane.
Perhaps he is a villain through and through,
And so deserves this cruel unnatural pain,
Or maybe he is not — whichever’s true,
He’s landed on the wrong side of the law.
He’s branded by the cat for evermore.

— D.N. O’Brien

Beersheba

Tags

4th Light Horse Brigade, AIF, Australian Light Horse, Australian Slouch hat, Beersheba, Beersheba Charge, Bush Poetry, German Officers, Negev Desert, Ottoman Empire, poem, poetry, The Battle of Beersheba, The Charge at Beersheba, Turkish soldiers, Turks, World War One

𝐁𝐞𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐛𝐚

Faint rays falling on the horses and the host,
And the Officers of Germany are dreaming of the coast.
Desert day is dawning, the defenders are dug in.
Slouch-hatted soldier scrapes the salt-beef from the tin.
Turk stokes the withered wood, spreads palms towards the fire,
And wonders why there are no mines, and where is the barbed wire?
On drags the dreary day and late grows the hour —
Before the sun begins to set, a cry from the tower:
“There are cavalry towards the east, so danger’s close at hand!”
But the Officers of Germany, the Turks don’t understand.
The Officers of Germany are tired of sweat and sand.
The Officers of Germany are in a foreign land.
An Officer of Germany screams at the Turks: “You see!
They are but mounted infantry — they are not cavalry!”
Eight hundred horsemen, mounted tall, that is the spotter’s count.
Eight hundred infantry, that’s all — and they will all dismount.
The Officers of Germany have fallen for the ruse;
The Officers in Germany will read the dreadful news.
Scream the German officers: “Men, now hold your fire!”
The Turks can see the plain, the rising dust, and no barbed wire.
Come on the lines of horsemen, and too late the Turkish sons
See that the riders won’t dismount — they’re underneath the guns.
Eight hundred riders make the charge and all of them stay mounted,
Except those who from their mounts fall, and thirty one are counted.
Slung on their backs their rifles, and with bayonets held on high,
They reach the Turkish trenches as the Turks shoot at the sky.
And suddenly the fighting is all over — as before,
This blasted land, the blood-soaked sand that knows the ways of war,
This poor Beersheba, once again, gives up her precious wells,
Remembering the pounding hooves, gun shots and bursting shells.
And many Turks that night they find a cold and dusty bed,
And slouch hats top the rifles of the riders who are dead.
The lucky Turks are led away into captivity,
As are those splendid men, the Officers of Germany.

— D.N. O’Brien

Beersheba Charge

Dams

Tags

Anti-dam fanatics, Australian bush poetry, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, dams, Green fanatics, irrigation, poem, poetry

The seed that’s planted in the endless rows,
With irrigation sprouts, emerges, grows.
But take away the sprays that make the rain,
And witness then, the graveyard of the grain,
As each seed shrinks and withers where it lies,
As in its blasted shell the life force dies —
A desolation sown thick with the dead,
Where could have been a field of golden bread.

To plant into the ground when parched and dry —
To throw the dice, the seed of wheat, of rye,
Upon the dust — to gamble with the gods;
Or else to irrigate the tumbled sods
And watch the seedlings germinate and thrive,
So those who would destroy the dams — survive.

— D.N. O’Brien

Dry Country

Tags

Australian bush poetry, Australian deserts, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bradfield Scheme, Bush Poetry, Flood, Formal poetry, Paroo River, poem, poetry, River diversion schemes in Australia

Like inland seas that stretch to far horizons,
The swirling waters soak the sodden plains.
And brown and foaming flow the streams flood-swollen,
Swelled high and wide by teeming monsoon rains.

The arid deserts bake in summer heat waves,
While ancient stream beds dream of former days.
The deluge on the coast flows out to oceans,
As sense and “progress” go their separate ways.

— D.N. O’Brien

{Image of the Paroo River by Peter Woodard via Wikipedia}

Cemetery Road

Tags

Australian bush poetry, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, Formal poetry, poem, poetry

Cemetery Road

It formed our northern boundary –
A rough dirt track that wound up to
Some toppled tombstones on the top
Of a bare hill. Occasionally
We’d see a motor car or two
Drive slowly up the road and stop,

And out would get some people who
Would walk amongst the scattered stones
And by a grave then stop, and stand,
And bow their heads. They were the few
Who stood above the mouldering bones
Deep down – embracing soil and sand.

I guess they were the ones who’d known
The dead who’d long been buried there.
It seemed that way, for they were old –
The ones who walked that overgrown
Old graveyard, hats in hand, heads bare,
In summer’s heat or winter’s cold.

But that was long ago, now those
Who visited back then have flown;
And who they were we’ll never know,
Nor why they came, and I suppose
They’ve gone the way of flesh and bone.
But some are not forgotten, so –

Now Cemetery Road is black
With tar, and tourists come to see
Where lie those ancient pioneers.
Each stone repaired, no chip or crack
To mar a curiosity –
That long ago was wet with tears.

That Lazy N

Tags

Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Branding cattle, Branding irons, Brands, Brands -lazy letters, Bush Poetry, Formal poetry, poem, poetry

That Lazy N

It stood for Noel, that lazy N.
He passed it on to me back when
He had no cattle left to brand.
He said: “It’s yours”, and shook my hand.

I used it then for many years.
It branded cows, it branded steers.
In glowing coals was often fired;
But now the old iron is retired.

No longer will its letters sear
The heifer’s hide – the wild-eyed steer
Won’t bellow as with fire and spark
The red-hot metal makes its mark.

Now painted green, the brand is cold.
The last to use it hot grows old.
It rests there on its wooden stand.
There are no cattle left to brand.

{photo – D.N. O’Brien}

Enemies

Tags

Armistice Day, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, poem, poetry, World War 1, world wars

Enemies

Two farm boys leave their families – their farms;
For each thinks it is right to take up arms.
Two boys, so much alike yet now at odds;
They’ve worked the cattle – sown the tumbled sods,
And harvested the golden fields of grain.
They’ve cursed the floods, and prayed to God for rain.

But now across a blasted shell-ploughed field
They face each other, and one’s fate is sealed.
Had they been neighbours they’d have been best friends,
But such is war – and so the story ends:
Just for a moment one raises his head;
The other aims and fires and shoots him dead.

The Hunter

Tags

Australian Aboriginals, Australian bush poetry, Australian poet, Australian traditional poetry, Bush Poetry, Formal poetry, Gidgee - Acacia cambagei, Hunter, poem, poetry, Woomera

Stands motionless, with spear haft thrust
Into the desert’s scarlet dust.
Upon one leg, foot on one knee,
Dark eyes through shimmering heat-haze see

Blurred forms towards him leap and bound
Across scorched plains of arid ground.
His muscles flex as ends his wait.
The lance is raised and now too late

The mob explodes in mortal fear
As woomera launches the spear
Of gidgee hardened by the flame;
Its flight is true and so his aim.

One kangaroo, gore-splattered grey;
A feast, his tribe will have this day.
He draws his weapon from the dead;
The jagged point glistens blood-red.