The Fremantle Press Anthology of Western Australian Poetry

by John Kinsella

  Was a blessing, unless it came at night,

  And peered in your hut, with the cunning fright

  Of a runaway convict; and even they

  Were welcome, for talk’s sake, while they could stay.

  Dave lived with me here for a while, and learned

  The tricks of the bush, — how the snare was laid

  In the wallaby track, how traps were made,

  How ’possums and kangaroo rats were killed,

  And when that was learned, I helped him to build

  From mahogany slabs a good bush hut,

  And showed him how sandal-wood logs were cut.

  I lived up there with him days and days,

  For I loved the lad for his honest ways.

  I had only one fault to find: at first

  Dave worked too hard; for a lad who was nursed,

  As he was, in idleness, it was strange

  How he cleared that sandal-wood off his range.

  From the morning light till the light expired

  He was always working, he never tired;

  Till at length I began to think his will

  Was too much settled on wealth, and still

  When I looked at the lad’s brown face, and eye

  Clear open, my heart gave such thought the lie.

  But one day — for he read my mind — he laid

  His hand on my shoulder: ‘Don’t be afraid,’

  Said he, ‘that I’m seeking alone for pelf.

  I work hard, friend; but ’tis not for myself.’

  And he told me then, in his quiet tone,

  Of a girl in Scotland, who was his own, —

  His wife, — ’twas for her: ’twas all he could say,

  And his clear eye brimmed as he turned away.

  After that he told me the simple tale:

  They had married for love, and she was to sail

  For Australia when he wrote home and told

  The oft-watched-for story of finding gold.

  In a year he wrote, and his news was good:

  He had bought some cattle and sold his wood.

  He said, ‘Darling, I’ve only a hut, — but come.’

  Friend, a husband’s heart is a true wife’s home;

  And he knew she’d come. Then he turned his hand

  To make neat the house, and prepare the land

  For his crops and vines; and he made that place

  Put on such a smiling and homelike face,

  That when she came, and he showed her round

  His sandal-wood and his crops in the ground,

  And spoke of the future, they cried for joy,

  The husband’s arm clasping his wife and boy.

  Well, friend, if a little of heaven’s best bliss

  Ever comes from the upper world to this,

  It came into that manly bushman’s life,

  And circled him round with the arms of his wife.

  God bless that bright memory! Even to me,

  A rough, lonely man, did she seem to be,

  While living, an angel of God’s pure love,

  And now I could pray to her face above.

  And David he loved her as only a man

  With a heart as large as was his heart can.

  I wondered how they could have lived apart,

  For he was her idol, and she his heart.

  Friend, there isn’t much more of the tale to tell:

  I was talking of angels awhile since. Well,

  Now I’ll change to a devil, — ay, to a devil!

  You needn’t start: if a spirit of evil

  Ever came to this world its hate to slake

  On mankind, it came as a Dukite Snake.

  Like? Like the pictures you’ve seen of Sin,

  A long red snake, — as if what was within

  Was fire that gleamed through his glistening skin.

  And his eyes! — if you could go down to hell

  And come back to your fellows here and tell

  What the fire was like, you could find no thing,

  Here below on the earth, or up in the sky,

  To compare it to but a Dukite’s eye!

  Now, mark you, these Dukites don’t go alone:

  There’s another near when you see but one;

  And beware you of killing that one you see

  Without finding the other; for you may be

  More than twenty miles from the spot that night,

  When camped, but you’re tracked by the lone Dukite,

  That will follow your trail like Death or Fate,

  And kill you as sure as you killed its mate!

  Well, poor Dave Sloane had his young wife here

  Three months, — ’twas just this time of the year.

  He had teamed some sandal-wood to the Vasse,

  And was homeward bound, when he saw in the grass

  A long red snake: he had never been told

  Of the Dukite’s ways, — he jumped to the road,

  And smashed its flat head with the bullock-goad!

  He was proud of the red skin, so he tied

  Its tail to the cart, and the snake’s blood dyed

  The bush on the path he followed that night.

  He was early home, and the dead Dukite

  Was flung at the door to be skinned next day.

  At sunrise next morning he started away

  To hunt up his cattle. A three hours’ ride

  Brought him back: he gazed on his home with pride

  And joy in his heart; he jumped from his horse

  And entered — to look on his young wife’s corse,

  And his dead child clutching his mother’s clothes

  As in fright; and there, as he gazed, arose

  From her breast, where ’twas resting, the gleaming head

  Of the terrible Dukite, as if it said,

  ‘I’ve had vengeance, my foe: you took all I had.’

  And so had the snake — David Sloane was mad!

  I rode to his hut just by chance that night,

  And there on the threshold the clear moonlight

  Showed the two snakes dead. I pushed in the door

  With an awful feeling of coming woe:

  The dead was stretched on the moonlit floor,

  The man held the hand of his wife, — his pride,

  His poor life’s treasure, — and crouched by her side.

  O God! I sank with the weight of the blow.

  I touched and called him: he heeded me not,

  So I dug her grave in a quiet spot,

  And lifted them both, — her boy on her breast, —

  And laid them down in the shade to rest.

  Then I tried to take my poor friend away,

  But he cried so woefully, ‘Let me stay

  Till she comes again!’ that I had no heart

  To try to persuade him then to part

  From all that was left to him here, — her grave;

  So I stayed by his side that night, and, save

  One heart-cutting cry, he uttered no sound, —

  O God! that wail — like the wail of a hound!

  ’Tis six long years since I heard that cry,

  But ’twill ring in my ears till the day I die.

  Since that fearful night no one has heard

  Poor David Sloane utter sound or word.

  You have seen to-day how he always goes:

  He’s been given that suit of convict’s clothes

  By some prison officer. On his back

  You noticed a load like a peddler’s pack?

  Well, that’s what he lives for: when reason went,

  Still memory lived, for the days are spent

  In searching for Dukites; and year by year

  That bundle of skins is growing. ’Tis clear

  That the Lord out of evil some good still takes;

  For he’s clearing this bush of the Dukite snakes.

  The Gaol

  Penal Colony of Western Australia, 1857


  The sun rose o’er dark Fremantle,

  And the Sentry stood on the wall;

  Above him, with white lines swinging,

  The flag-staff, bare and tall:

  The flag at its foot — the Mutiny Flag —

  Was always fast to the line, —

  For its sanguine field was a cry of fear,

  And the Colony counted an hour a year

  In the need of the blood-red sign.

  The staff and the line, with its ruddy flash,

  Like a threat or an evil-bode,

  Were a monstrous whip with a crimson lash,

  Fit sign for the penal code.

  The Sentry leant on his rifle, and stood

  By the mast, with a deep-drawn breath;

  A stern-browed man, but there heaved a sigh

  For the sight that greeted his downward eye

  In the prison-square beneath.

  In yellow garb, in soldier lines,

  One hundred men in chains;

  While the watchful warders, sword in hand,

  With eyes suspicious keenly scanned

  The links of the living lanes.

  There, wary eyes met stony eyes,

  And stony face met stone.

  There was never a gleam of trust or truce;

  In the covert thought of an iron loose,

  Grim warder and ward were one. …

  Henry Ebenezer Clay (b.1844 d.1896)

  from Two and Two

  V.

  An arid, dusty landwind, wakens Herbert

  From the Sahara of a dream; with lips

  Parched, while a heat like powder frets the skin.

  A drought is in the air; and the grey clouds

  Hanging aloft, or mistlike on the hills,

  Tell not of moisture to his practised eye, —

  But thirsty heat, lapping the wilderness

  With tongues of fire!

  Stooping beside the waters,

  He draws large draughts, till, eager to embrace

  The rapture of their coolness, he leaps up

  To cast aside his garments; but a black

  And lurid pillar of smoke, seeming at hand

  Tho’ leagues between them lie, has fascinated

  His watchful gaze, and dashed a sudden fear

  Thro’ all his veins, — for those devouring flames

  Are raging homeward!

  Snatching a light axe,

  Wherewith he scarred the trees to mark his route,

  He cuts a footing in the thick, smooth bark

  Of a white-gum, whose branchy crown appears

  High o’er the common woods; and, step by step,

  Scaling its lofty pillar, gains the landing

  Of a cross bough, and scans the distant glow.

  ‘Home! home!’ he cries: ‘Bucephalus, good nag!

  Drink well, and splash the waters; for I trow

  We go thro’ fires to-day!’

  And with stretched arms

  Half compassing the stately stem, he slides

  Swift to the foot, and gains his steed, and girths

  The saddle tightly; and without a thought

  Of food, or perils he must brave, or ought

  But one great fear — for those he left at home, —

  Gives his brave nag the spur, and on, on, on,

  Thro’ the thick boughs whose branches beat his face,

  Whose stretched-out arms he, stooping, scarce avoids;

  While not for thicket-thorns, nor trees down-fallen,

  Nor boulders rough, nor banks precipitous

  Of wild ravines where winter torrents streamed, —

  Bucephalus makes pause, nor turns aside!

  Now have they reached the rear-guard of the flames;

  Black ruin girt about with fallen limbs

  That smoulder as they lie.

  On! on, good horse!

  The heat grows fierce, the earth seems all aglow;

  Branches are falling round them; forky tongues

  Leap o’er the roadway that alone can save

  Horse and his rider, from the battle-front

  That lowers on either side!

  On! on, good horse!

  Brave rider, clasp your arms about his neck,

  And cheer him, lest his terror leave no choice

  But death, — death for ye both!

  The hot flames wrestle:

  Irruption fierce, mid seas of lava glow;

  Devouring billows, feeding as they roll,

  On bark and cones of Banksia, fronded Palms,

  Ferns, Casuarinas; woods that scent the flames;

  Charred trunks Xanthorrhoean, with their rods and reeds

  Blazing; while veteran trees thro’ trunk and bough,

  Time-hollowed, feel the rage of hidden fires,

  Roaring and writhing thro’ their branchy flues,

  With furnace heat: and over hill and plain

  Rolls the dire flood, — a wilderness of ruin, —

  A burning world!

  Fly! fly, ye flocks and herds!

  Ye horses, spurn the flames with sounding hoofs!

  Seek safety — for no shelter can ye trust —

  On some charred pasture where ye fed before!

  And fly, good steed! and fly, brave youth; for those

  Thou lovest are in danger!

  Now the homesteads

  Lie at his feet, and all the upper slope

  Is blazing; while in vain the labourers toil,

  With leafy boughs to beat the torrent back,

  Swift rushing thro’ the cornfields.

  ‘Home!’ he cries;

  And leaping to the earth a flaming brand

  Plucks from the fires, and to the standing corn,

  Hard by the doors of each imperilled home,

  The torch applies; and beats the rising flames

  Back on their fellows, — till the torrents meet,

  Devouring and devoured, in mutual death.

  So, when fierce foes upon the frontiers hang

  Of his dear fatherland, the valorous hind,

  Grown warrior in his country’s need, holds forth

  The fatal torch to harvests he hath reared, —

  Rather himself to hunger than to yield

  Such forage to the spoiler.

  Not a spark

  Has touched the precious roof-trees; but, alas!

  The golden grain, the labours of the year,

  Lie black upon the smoking fields, unhoused,

  Reaped with the brazen sickle of the flames.

  Cattle on yonder hill rush to and fro,

  Scared, lowing wildly, as the burning tide

  Beats upward fiercely, and no outlet leaves,

  Save one straight path arched overhead with fire!

  Hurrah! a horseman thro’ the flaming gorge

  Dashes, low bending o’er his foaming steed!

  Unheard amid the roar the stockwhip smites

  The riven air, and quivers on the flank

  Of dazed cattle, that the archway view,

  And dare not pass, and dare not turn again;

  Bewildered, blinded, — till the lash

  Decides and turns the balance of their fears;

  And headlong plunging, snorting thro’ the flames,

  The frantic herd are driven!

  The archway bends,

  And the boughs crack; and like a javelin

  A splintered branch strikes, rooted in the earth.

  Hurrah! the horseman hath the open gained:

  Hurrah! — But his steed trembles, and his knees

  May fail, ere he can pass that heaving bulk,

  Asunder parting, — quivering to the fall!

  Bucephalus bounds forward, and the boughs

  Strike on him as they fall, and he has passed; —

  But Frank! Frank Herbert! Frank the hero-boy! —

  Where is he? — and the neighbours up the bank

  Are hurrying; and Ruth and Elsie breathe
/>   Hot, gasping prayers, and fly o’er smoking fields

  To learn if he among the fires hath perished,

  In saving life that thousand-thousand-fold

  Were nought to his.

  And there the brave boy lies,

  Under rough boughs that spared the flying steed,

  But swept his rider down. The burning leaves

  They tear away, and quench the smouldering trunk,

  Within whose hollow Ruth and Elsie oft

  Have sheltered from a shower. Then strong, rough hands,

  Yet trembling in their eagerness, bear up

  The cruel branches; — and the motion stirs

  A splintered wound; and hark, they hear a groan.

  ‘Bless his dear heart,’ cries one, — ‘he is not dead,

  And we may save him. Gently, gently, there:

  Let me creep under, and the splinters loose

  That bite his wound.’

  And the strong men stand round,

  And firmly, patiently, bear up such a load

  Of massive boughs as forces the big drops

  From their swart brows: and still the other seeks

  To loosen without pain the jagged wood

  That rankles in the poor boy’s wounded arm.

  ‘’Tis broken, sure enough; and badly, too’

  He mutters: ‘Brave young master! I’d as lief

  Have died myself, or broken every limb,

  As see him suffer! Aye, he’ll never groan,

  If he can hold his breath; but it is hard,

  Hard, — very hard; and though I try my best

  To save him pain, I feel the wincing spasms

  At every touch. Now bear a hand; — yet stay, —

  His foot is badly hurt: poor lad! poor fellow!

  I doubt he has as lief the trees had struck

  Another blow, and finished!’

  And, at last,

  The boughs are higher lifted, and a pale,

  Scarce living form is borne down tenderly

  To his sad home: and there are women’s tears,

  And rough men dash their hands across their eyes,

  And turn away; and Elsie hides her head,

  Smothering weary sobs: and only Ruth —

  Ruth with the anguish deepest at her heart —

  Bears a brave face, and, bending over him,

  Swaths his poor helpless limbs, and bathes his brow

  With fragrant waters; and, amid the shade

  Of darkened rooms, moves like a blessed spirit, —

  A beauteous orb, — folding her lunar grey

  Of sadness in the crescent-wings of love.

  ‘Humanitas’ (n.d.)

  A Blackfellow’s Appeal

  To the Editor of the Inquirer & Commercial News

  My Dear Mr. Editor, — A short time ago as I was sauntering along one of the streets of Busselton on a gloomy evening I happened to meet an aged Chief of the name of Bungert, who complained bitterly to me that the Government had not forwarded the usual supply of blankets this season for distribution amongst his people, and requested that I would write to His Excellency on the subject. The enclosed is a translation of what he desired me to say, and if you think it worthy of a corner in your valuable journal you are welcome to it.