An Anthem for the Australasian League
SHALL we sing of Loyalty
To the far South’s fiery youth?
Yea—but let the pæan be
Of loyalty to God and Truth:
To Man, to progress, and to all
The free things, nobly free,
Of which their loved Australia shall
The golden cradle be.
Hark! her star-eyed Destinies
Pour their voices o’er the seas—
Hither, to the Land of Gold,
All who would be free!
Here a diadem behold
For immortal Liberty!
Not for Old World queens and kings,
Villain Slavery’s outworn things!
Shall we sing of Loyalty
In this new and genial Land?
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poem by Charles Harpur
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Song!
A thousand million souls arise
Out of the cradle of to-day,
And, like a living storm, beneath the skies
Go thundering on their fatal way!
But ere to-morrow’s sun
His ancient round hath run,
That storm is past—and Where are they?
Is asked of Faith by pale Dismay:
“Where—where are they?”
And Faith—even Faith herself—hath not a word to say.
With her serene assurance thrown
Like moonlight into the Unknown
And all her clasping tendrils curled
About the steadfast pillars of the never-failing world,
To that wild question of Dismay
Yet hath she not a word to say,
And only lifts her patient eyes
Up from the earth’s change-trampled sod,
To fix them, out in the eternal skies,
On all she knoweth—God.
poem by Charles Harpur
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This Southern Land of Ours
With alien hearts to frame our laws
And cheat us as of old,
In vain our soil is rich, in vain
'Tis seamed with virgin gold:
But the present only yields us nought,
The future only lours
Till we dare to be a people
In this Southern Land of Ours.
What would pygmean statesmen but
Our new-world prospects blast,
By chaining native enterprise
To Europe's pauper past,
With all its misery for the mass,
And fraud-upholden powers;
But we'll yet have men, - like Cromwell,
In this Southern Land of Ours.
And lo, the unploughed future, boys,
May yet be all our own,
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poem by Charles Harpur
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Asking in Vain
Still his little grave she seeketh
In her mother-sorrow wild,
Hush! While in her heart she speaketh
To the spirit of her child:
“Were we not to one another
Once the sum of all sweet gain?
Say then—say unto thy mother,
Shall we ever meet again?
Darling, shall we meet again,
Knowing, loving one another?
“Ah! What weary, weary sorrows
Have I known through loss of thee,
And what comfortless to-morrows
Wait me in this misery!
Were we not to one another
Once the sum of all sweet gain?
Say then—say unto thy mother,
Shall we ever meet again?
Darling, shall we meet again,
Knowing, loving one another?”
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poem by Charles Harpur
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Ecce Homo
A man of sorrows and with grief acquainted,
He bowed His beauteous head to the rude hands
Of Pilate’s hireling bands;
And while beneath their cruel scourge He fainted,
Forgave them, yearning through His shameful smart
Even with a brother’s heart.
And when upon their Roman cross they nailed Him,
With mocking hatred and scorn’s bitter smile,
Hark! How He prayed, the while
Nature’s extremest agony assailed Him—
“Father, Thy mercy unto these renew,
They know not what they do.”
For the great precept of His Christianity
Was always, “Live in charity; yea, live
To love and to forgive,
That so My spirit may through all humanity
Pass ever downward with a widening birth,
Till peace possess the earth.”
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poem by Charles Harpur
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The Flight of Peace
TRUST and Treachery, Wisdom, Folly,
Madness, Mirth and Melancholy,
Love and Hatred, Thrift and Pillage,
All are housed in one small village.
And if such be Life’s mix’d being,
Where may Peace from ruin fleeing,
Find a shelter and inherit
All the calm of her own merit?
In a bark of gentle motion
Sailing on the summer ocean?
There worst war the tempest wages
And the whirlpool’s hunger rages.
In some lonely new-world bower,
Hidden like a forest flower?
There too, there, to irk the stranger,
Stalks the wild-eyed spirit Danger!
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poem by Charles Harpur
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The Hunter's Indian Dove
DARK is her cheek, but her blood’s rich blush
Comes through its dusk with a sunset flush,
While joy, like a prairie-bee, slaketh its drouth
At the red honey-cup of her smiling mouth,
And her wild eyes glow, like meteors, there
’Neath the streaming storm of her night-black hair.
And ever I pride in my forest choice,
The more while I list to her bird-like voice,
Warbling old songs in her own wild speech,
But with this new burden still added to each;
“Who’ll pity, who’ll comfort the dark wood-dove
When the white hawk leaves her to die of love?
O then, by the artless tears that rise
’Neath the downcast lids of her gleaming eyes—
By the truthfully tender and touching grace
That boding passion then lends to her face—
I swear, in the very wild spirit of love,
Never to leave her, my Indian dove!
poem by Charles Harpur
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A Hunter's Indian Dove
DARK is her cheek, but her blood’s rich blush
Comes through its dusk with a sunset flush,
While joy, like a prairie-bee, slaketh its drouth
At the red honey-cup of her smiling mouth,
And her wild eyes glow, like meteors, there
’Neath the streaming storm of her night-black hair.
And ever I pride in my forest choice,
The more while I list to her bird-like voice,
Warbling old songs in her own wild speech,
But with this new burden still added to each;
“Who’ll pity, who’ll comfort the dark wood-dove
When the white hawk leaves her to die of love?
O then, by the artless tears that rise
’Neath the downcast lids of her gleaming eyes—
By the truthfully tender and touching grace
That boding passion then lends to her face—
I swear, in the very wild spirit of love,
Never to leave her, my Indian dove!
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poem by Charles Harpur
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Music
In vain, when music’s seraph-fire
Runs kindling through the air,
Making it such as gods respire,
(And gods perhaps are there!)
In vain would words of subtlest wit
Reveal, as on they roll,
The clouds of glory it hath lit
Like sunrise in the soul!
Like sunrise when its conquering glow
Smites through the vapours cold,
Till all their ragged inlets flow
With floods of burning gold.
--------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------
Like him who great reports of tilth rejects,
Because his own is a most barren field,
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poem by Charles Harpur
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Hope On
Power's a cheat, success but trying,
Even pleasure bears a sting;
Still ’tis useless, useless sighing,
Rather list to Hope replying—
“The flowers must come again with spring;
And in the trampled way we re going
Streams of comfort yet are flowing—
Hark! I hear them murmuring.”
Fame’s a liar in the nation!
Love hath oft a wayward wing;
Still, hence seek not for occasion
To impugn Hope’s sweet persuasion—
“The flowers will come again with spring;
And in the world-wide way we re going
Streams of pure good yet are flowing—
Hark! I hear them murmuring.”
Friendship turns, itself denying
Even Truth the heart may wring;
Still, though trust be daily dying,
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poem by Charles Harpur
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