The Clock's Clear Voice Into The Clearer Air
THE cock's clear voice into the clearer air
Where westward far I roam,
Mounts with a thrill of hope,
Falls with a sigh of home.
A rural sentry, he from farm and field
The coming morn descries,
And, mankind's bugler, wakes
The camp of enterprise.
He sings the morn upon the westward hills
Strange and remote and wild;
He sings it in the land
Where once I was a child.
He brings to me dear voices of the past,
The old land and the years:
My father calls for me,
My weeping spirit hears.
Fife, fife, into the golden air, O bird,
And sing the morning in;
For the old days are past
And new days begin.
poem by Robert Louis Stevenson
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Autumn's Song
.
.
a cardinal sings this autumn morn
the chill refreshes
as a new day is born
the colors golden, and green
so peaceful, and serene
a cardinal sings this autumn morn
voices rip
a quiet now torn
footsteps slide in a pattern
smiles appear
glances of wonder clear
as a cardinal disappears
just like a breeze
a cardinal sang this autumn morn
a melody unheard before
ignored by many
cherished by me
it’s meomory forever more
as flickers of red touch the sky
i ponder the question why
a cardinal sings this autumn morn
.
Over The Hills And Far Away
A LITTLE bird flew my window by,
'Twixt the level street and the level sky,
The level rows of houses tall,
The long low sun on the level wall;
And all that the little bird did say
Was, 'Over the hills and far away.'
A little bird sang behind my chair,
From the level line of corn-fields fair,
The smooth green hedgerow's level bound
Not a furlong off--the horizon's bound,
And the level lawn where the sun all day
Burns:--'Over the hills and far away.'
A little bird sings above my bed,
And I know if I could but lift my head
I would see the sun set, round and grand,
Upon level sea and level sand,
While beyond the misty distance gray
Is 'Over the hills and far away.'
I think that a little bird will sing
Over a grassy mound, next spring,
Where something that once was me, ye'll leave
In the level sunshine, morn and eve:
But I shall be gone, past night, past day,
Over the hills and far away.
poem by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
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The Sailor's Return
This morn I lay a-dreaming,
This morn, this merry morn,
When the cock crew shrill from over the hill,
I heard a bugle horn.
And thro' the dream I was dreaming,
There sighed the sigh of the sea,
And thro' the dream I was dreaming,
This voice came singing to me.
'High over the breakers,
Low under the lee,
Sing ho
The billow,
And the lash of the rolling sea!
'Boat, boat, to the billow,
Boat, boat, to the lee!
Love on thy pillow,
Art thou dreaming of me?
'Billow, billow, breaking,
Land us low on the lee!
For sleeping or waking,
Sweet love, I am coming to thee!
'High, high, o'er the breakers,
Low, low, on the lee,
Sing ho!
The billow
That brings me back to thee!'
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Christmas Morning
The angel host that sped last night,
Bearing the wondrous news afar,
Came in their ever-glorious flight
Unto a slumbering little star.
'Awake and sing, O star!' they cried.
'Awake and glorify the morn!
Herald the tidings far and wide--
He that shall lead His flock is born!'
The little star awoke and sung
As only stars in rapture may,
And presently where church bells hung
The joyous tidings found their way.
'Awake, O bells! 't is Christmas morn--
Awake and let thy music tell
To all mankind that now is born
What Shepherd loves His lambkins well!'
Then rang the bells as fled the night
O'er dreaming land and drowsing deep,
And coming with the morning light,
They called, my child, to you asleep.
Sweetly and tenderly they spoke,
And lingering round your little bed,
Their music pleaded till you woke,
And this is what their music said:
'Awake and sing! 'tis Christmas morn,
Whereon all earth salutes her King!
In Bethlehem is the Shepherd born.
Awake, O little lamb, and sing!'
So, dear my child, kneel at my feet,
And with those voices from above
Share thou this holy time with me,
The universal hymn of love.
poem by Eugene Field
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Come Home, Father!
'Tis The
SONG OF LITTLE MARY,
Standing at the bar-room door
While the shameful midnight revel
Rages wildly as before.
Father, dear father, come home with me now!
The clock in the steeple strikes one;
You said you were coming right home from the shop,
As soon as your day's work was done.
Our fire has gone out our house is all dark
And mother's been watching since tea, --
With poor brother Benny so sick in her arms,
And no one to help her but me. --
Come home! come home! come home! --
Please, father, dear father, come home. --
Hear the sweet voice of the child
Which the night winds repeat as they roam!
Oh who could resist this most plaintive of prayers?
"Please, father, dear father, come home."
Father, dear father, come home with me now!
The clock in the steeple strikes two;
The night has grown colder, and Benny is worse
But he has been calling for you.
Indeed he is worse Ma says he will die,
Perhaps before morning shall dawn; --
And this is the message she sent me to bring
"Come quickly, or he will be gone." --
Come home! come home! come home! --
Please, father, dear father, come home. --
Hear the sweet voice of the child
Which the night winds repeat as they roam!
Oh who could resist this most plaintive of prayers?
"Please, father, dear father, come home."
Father, dear father, come home with me now!
The clock in the steeple strikes three;
The house is so lonely the hours are so long
For poor weeping mother and me.
Yes, we are alone poor Benny is dead,
And gone with the angels of light; --
And these were the very last words that he said
"I want to kiss Papa good night." --
Come home! come home! come home! --
Please, father, dear father, come home. --
Hear the sweet voice of the child
Which the night winds repeat as they roam!
Oh who could resist this most plaintive of prayers?
"Please, father, dear father, come home."
poem by Henry Clay Work
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They Desire A Better Country
I
I would not if I could undo my past,
Tho' for its sake my future is a blank;
My past, for which I have myself to thank,
For all its faults and follies first and last.
I would not cast anew the lot once cast,
Or launch a second ship for one that sank,
Or drug with sweets the bitterness I drank,
Or break by feasting my perpetual fast.
I would not if I could: for much more dear
Is one remembrance than a hundred joys,
More than a thousand hopes in jubilee;
Dearer the music of one tearful voice
That unforgotten calls and calls to me,
'Follow me here, rise up, and follow here.'
II
What seekest thou far in the unknown land?
In hope I follow joy gone on before,
In hope and fear persistent more and more,
As the dry desert lengthens out its sand.
Whilst day and night I carry in my hand
The golden key to ope the golden door
Of golden home; yet mine eye weepeth sore
For the long journey that must make no stand.
And who is this that veiled doth walk with thee?
Lo, this is Love that walketh at my right;
One exile holds us both, and we are bound
To selfsame home-joys in the land of light.
Weeping thou walkest with him; weepeth he?—
Some sobbing weep, some weep and make no sound.
III
A dimness of a glory glimmers here
Thro' veils and distance from the space remote,
A faintest far vibration of a note
Reaches to us and seems to bring us near,
Causing our face to glow with braver cheer,
Making the serried mist to stand afloat,
Subduing langour with an antidote,
And strengthening love almost to cast out fear,
Till for one moment golden city walls
Rise looming on us, golden walls of home,
Light of our eyes until the darkness falls;
Then thro' the outer darkness burdensome
I hear again the tender voice that calls,
'Follow me hither, follow, rise, and come.'
poem by Christina Georgina Rossetti
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Oh To Be Back Home In Ireland (To Jo)
Oh to be back home in Ireland now that April winds are blowing
And the weather getting milder and the green grass is a growing
And the breath of Spring is in the air and daylight hours grow long
And the skylark o'er the heather sings his merry April song.
Oh to be back home in Ireland the Country of my birth
The Land where I was bred and raised the greenest Land on Earth,
Land of the grassy valleys and scenic heather hills
Of murmuring brooks and rivers and rippling mountain rills.
I have travelled thousands of miles from my home in County Cork
I have been to London City and westward to New York,
I have seen the lights of Paris and the seven hills of Rome
But my heart is always yearning for my Country and my home.
And it's oh to be in Ireland now that April days are here
And the wildborn birds are singing in the Springtime of the year
And the wildflowers are a blooming and new leaves grow on the trees
In the Country I was raised in way beyond Atlantic seas.
poem by Francis Duggan
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An Old Colonist's Reverie
Dustily over the highway pipes the loud nor'-wester at morn,
Wind and the rising sun, and waving tussock and corn;
It brings to me days gone by when first in my ears it rang,
The wind is the voice of my home, and I think of the songs it sang
When, fresh from the desk and ledger, I crossed the long leagues of sea
'The old worn world is gone and the new bright world is free.'
The wide, wild pastures of old are fading and passing away,
All over the plain are the homes of the men who have come to stay
I sigh for the good old days in the station whare again;
But the good new days are better
I would not be heard to complain;
It is only the wind that cries with tears in its voice to me
Of the dead men low in the mould who came with me over the sea.
Some of them down in the city under the marble are laid,
Some on the bare hillside in the mound by the lone tree shade,
And some in the forest deeps of the west in their silence lie,
With the dark pine curtain above shutting out the blue of the sky.
And many have passed from my sight, whither I never shall know,
Swept away in the rushing river or caught in the mountain snow;
All the old hands are gone who came with me over the sea,
But the land that we made our own is the same bright land to me.
There are dreams in the gold of the kowhai, and when ratas are breaking in bloom
I can hear the rich murmur of voices in the deeps of the fern-shadowed gloom.
Old memory may bring me her treasures from the land of the blossoms of May,
But to me the hill daisies are dearer and the gorse on the river bed grey;
While the mists on the high hilltops curling, the dawn-haunted
haze of the sea,
To my fancy are bridal veils lifting from the face of the land of the free.
The speargrass and cabbage trees yonder, the honey-belled flax in its bloom,
The dark of the bush on the sidings, the snow-crested mountains that loom
Golden and grey in the sunlight, far up in the cloud-fringed blue,
Are the threads with old memory weaving and the line of my life
running through;
And the wind of the morning calling has ever a song for me
Of hope for the land of the dawning in the golden years to be.
poem by David McKee Wright
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Sacred to the Memory of “Unknown”
Oh, the wild black swans fly westward still,
While the sun goes down in glory—
And away o’er lonely plain and hill
Still runs the same old story:
The sheoaks sigh it all day long—
It is safe in the Big Scrub’s keeping—
’Tis the butcher-birds’ and the bell-birds’ song
In the gum where ‘Unknown’ lies sleeping—
(It is heard in the chat of the soldier-birds
O’er the grave where ‘Unknown’ lies sleeping).
Ah! the Bushmen knew not his name or land,
Or the shame that had sent him here—
But the Bushmen knew by the dead man’s hand
That his past life lay not near.
The law of the land might have watched for him,
Or a sweetheart, wife, or mother;
But they bared their heads, and their eyes were dim,
For he might have been a brother!
(Ah! the death he died brought him near to them,
For he might have been a brother.)
Oh, the wild black swans to the westward fade,
And the sunset burns to ashes,
And three times bright on an eastern range
The light of a big star flashes,
Like a signal sent to a distant strand
Where a dead man’s love sits weeping.
And the night comes grand to the Great Lone Land
O’er the grave where ‘Unknown’ lies sleeping,
And the big white stars in their clusters blaze
O’er the Bush where ‘Unknown’ lies sleeping.
poem by Henry Lawson
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New Love, New Life
I.
She, who so long has lain
Stone-stiff with folded wings,
Within my heart again
The brown bird wakes and sings.
Brown nightingale, whose strain
Is heard by day, by night,
She sings of joy and pain,
Of sorrow and delight.
II.
'Tis true,--in other days
Have I unbarred the door;
He knows the walks and ways--
Love has been here before.
Love blest and love accurst
Was here in days long past;
This time is not the first,
But this time is the last.
Stepping Westward
"What, you are stepping westward?"--"Yea."
---'T would be a wildish destiny,
If we, who thus together roam
In a strange land, and far from home,
Were in this place the guests of Chance:
Yet who would stop, or fear to advance,
Though home or shelter he had none,
With such a sky to lead him on?
The dewy ground was dark and cold;
Behind, all gloomy to behold;
And stepping westward seemed to be
A kind of heavenly destiny:
I liked the greeting; 't was a sound
Of something without place or bound;
And seemed to give me spiritual right
To travel through that region bright.
The voice was soft, and she who spake
Was walking by her native lake:
The salutation had to me
The very sound of courtesy:
Its power was felt; and while my eye
Was fixed upon the glowing sky,
The echo of the voice enwrought
A human sweetness with the thought
Of travelling through the world that lay
Before me in my endless way.
poem by William Wordsworth
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An Old Colonist's Reverie
Dustily over the highway pipes the loud nor'-wester at morn,
Wind and the rising sun, and waving tussock and corn;
It brings to me days gone by when first in my ears it rang,
The wind is the voice of my home, and I think of the songs it sang
When, fresh from the desk and ledger, I crossed the long leagues of sea --
"The old worn world is gone and the new bright world is free."
The wide, wild pastures of old are fading and passing away,
All over the plain are the homes of the men who have come to stay --
I sigh for the good old days in the station whare again;
But the good new days are better -- I would not be heard to complain;
It is only the wind that cries with tears in its voice to me
Of the dead men low in the mould who came with me over the sea.
Some of them down in the city under the marble are laid,
Some on the bare hillside in the mound by the lone tree shade,
And some in the forest deeps of the west in their silence lie,
With the dark pine curtain above shutting out the blue of the sky.
And many have passed from my sight, whither I never shall know,
Swept away in the rushing river or caught in the mountain snow;
All the old hands are gone who came with me over the sea,
But the land that we made our own is the same bright land to me.
There are dreams in the gold of the kowhai, and when ratas are breaking
in bloom
I can hear the rich murmur of voices in the deeps of the fern-shadowed gloom.
Old memory may bring me her treasures from the land of the blossoms of May,
But to me the hill daisies are dearer and the gorse on the river bed grey;
While the mists on the high hilltops curling, the dawn-haunted
haze of the sea,
To my fancy are bridal veils lifting from the face of the land of the free.
The speargrass and cabbage trees yonder, the honey-belled flax in its bloom,
The dark of the bush on the sidings, the snow-crested mountains that loom
Golden and grey in the sunlight, far up in the cloud-fringed blue,
Are the threads with old memory weaving and the line of my life
running through;
And the wind of the morning calling has ever a song for me
Of hope for the land of the dawning in the golden years to be.
poem by David McKee Wright
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Come Back to the Farm!
Brother, come back! come back!
Dear brother, what can be the charm,
That holds you so strong -- that keeps you so long
Away from your father's able farm?
Poor Father, he tells how he needs you --
And would it be more than is due.
His labors to share, his burdens to bear,
Who once bore your burdens for you!
'Tis the voice of your sister -- she calls you,
In tones both of love and alarm!
"By dead mother's prayers -- by father's gray hairs --
Dear brother, come back to the farm."
Father, tho' years ago
The ablest and strongest of men,
Is failing at last -- you know he has past
The milestone of three-score and ten.
He's feeble, he's trembling, he's lonely,
Who once was so fearless and brave;
Yet you are away, while day after day
He totters on down to the grave.
Come from the wide, wide world,
Where dangers and perile abound!
Oh how can you roam so far from your home,
Where safety and comfort are found?
Come bring us the light of your presence,
Come give us the strength of your arm;
That we may once more see joy, as of yore,
Sit smiling upon the old farm.
poem by Henry Clay Work
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The Voice that Sings
The voice that sings across the night
Of long forgotten days and things,
Is there an ear to hear aright
The voice that sings?
It is as when a curfew rings
Melodious in the dying light,
A sound that flies on pulsing wings.
And faded eyes that once were bright
Brim over, as to life it brings
The echo of a dead delight,
The voice that sings.
poem by Robert Fuller Murray
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The Author's Early Life
I will write a sketch of my early life,
It will be of childhood day,
And all who chance to read it,
No criticism, pray.
My childhood days were happy,
And it fills my heart with woe,
To muse o'er the days that have passed by
And the scenes of long ago.
In the days of my early childhood,
Kent county was quite wild,
Especially the towns I lived in
When I was a little child.
I will not speak of my birthplace,
For if you will only look
O'er the little poem, My Childhood Days,
That is in this little book.
I am not ashamed of my birthright,
Though it was of poor estate,
Many a poor person in our land
Has risen to be great.
My parents were poor, I know, kind friends,
But that is no disgrace;
They were honorable and respected
Throughout my native place.
My mother was an invalid,
And was for many a year,
And I being the eldest daughter
Her life I had to cheer.
I had two little sisters,
And a brother which made three,
And dear mother being sickly,
Their care it fell on me.
My parents moved to Algoma
Near twenty-three years ago,
And bought one hundred acres of land,
That's a good sized farm you know.
It was then a wilderness,
With tall forest trees abound,
And it was four miles from a village,
Or any other town.
And it was two miles from a schoolhouse,
That's the distance I had to go,
And how many times I traveled
Through summer suns and winter snow.
How well do I remember
Going to school many a morn,
Both in summer and in winter,
Through many a heavy storm.
My heart was gay and happy,
This was ever in my mind,
There is better times a coming,
And I hope some day to find
Myself capable of composing.
It was by heart's delight,
To compose on a sentimental subject
If it came in my mind just right.
If I went to school half the time,
It was all that I could do;
It seems very strange to me sometimes,
And it may seem strange to you.
It was natural for me to compose,
And put words into rhyme,
And the success of my first work
Is this little song book of mine.
My childhood days have passed and gone,
And it fills my heart with pain
To think that youth will nevermore
Return to me again.
And now kind friends, what I have wrote,
I hope you will pass o'er,
And not criticise as some have done,
Hitherto herebefore.
poem by Julia A Moore
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Idyll
In the grey summer garden I shall find you
With day-break and the morning hills behind you.
There will be rain-wet roses; stir of wings;
And down the wood a thrush that wakes and sings.
Not from the past you’ll come, but from that deep
Where beauty murmurs to the soul asleep:
And I shall know the sense of life re-born
From dreams into the mystery of morn
Where gloom and brightness meet. And standing there
Till that calm song is done, at last we’ll share
The league-spread, quiring symphonies that are
Joy in the world, and peace, and dawn’s one star.
poem by Siegfried Sassoon
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Morn birds, noon birds
the joyous chirp
of a sparrow
in the morn sky
sends a heaven into me
for a moment
i am the piano
and the chirp
a finger that sends
pleasant notes
reverberating
through my soul
this afternoon
heard the more
sedated chirps
of a bird on a wire
the halcyon noon
where the sun and
comfortable temperature
entice you to bed
note after note
the bird sings
wheeling nauseatic
nostalgic images
through my brain
school days,
childhood friends
and those days
that reminded us
of dream chasers
in a land of honey
the colour of light brown amber
inspired by
poem by John Tiong Chunghoo
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Morning Glow
Morning glow morning glow
Starts to glimmer when you know
Winds of change are set to blow
And sweep this whole land through
Morning glow is long past due
Morning glow fill the earth
Come on shine far all youre worth
Well be present at the birth
Of all faith looking new
Morning glow is long past due
Oh oh morning glow
Id like to help you grow
You should have started long ago
Morning glow all days long
For we sing tomorrows song
Never knew we could be so strong
But now its very clear
Morning glow is almost here
Oh oh morning glow
Id like to help you grow
We should have started long ago
Morning glow all your life
We can make the new day right
All the bad songs of the night
Will fade into the past
Morning glow is here at last
song performed by by Michael Jackson
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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We May Roam Through This World
We may roam through this world, like a child at a feast,
Who but sips of a sweet, and then flies to the rest;
And, when pleasure begins to grow dull in the east,
We may order our wings and be off to the west:
But if hearts that feel, and eyes that smile,
Are the dearest gifts that heaven supplies,
We never need leave our own green isle,
For sensitive hearts, and for sun-bright eyes.
Then, remember, wherever your goblet is crown'd,
Through this world, whether eastward or westward you roam,
When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round,
Oh! remember the smile which adorns her at home.
In England, the garden of Beauty is kept
By a dragon of prudery placed within call;
But so oft this unamiable dragon has slept,
That the garden's but carelessly watch'd after all.
Oh! they want the wild sweet-briery fence
Which round the flowers of Erin dwells;
Which warns the touch, while winning the sense,
Nor charms us least when it most repels.
Then remember, wherever your goblet is crown'd,
Through this world, whether eastward or westward you roam,
When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round,
Oh! remember the smile that adorns her at home.
In France, when the heart of a woman sets sail,
On the ocean of wedlock its fortune to try,
Love seldom goes far in a vessel so frail,
But just pilots her off, and then bids her good-bye.
While the daughters of Erin keep the boy,
Ever smiling beside his faithful oar,
Through billows of woe, and beams of joy,
The same as he look's when he left the shore.
Then remember, wherever your goblet is crown'd,
Through this world, whether eastward or westward you roam,
When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round,
Oh! remember the smile that adorns her at home.
poem by Thomas Moore
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A Word from the Bards
IT IS New Year’s Day and I rise to state that here on the Sydney side
The Bards have commenced to fill out of late and they’re showing their binjies with pride
They’re patting their binjies with pride, old man, and I want you to understand,
That a binjied bard is a bard indeed when he sings in the Southern Land,
Old chaps,
When he sings in the Southern Land.
For the Southern Land is the Poet’s Home, and over the world’s wide roam,
There was never till now a binjied bard that lived in a poet’s home, old man;
For the poet’s home was a hell on earth, and I want you to understand,
That it isn’t exactly a paradise down here in the Southern Land,
Old chap,
Down here in the Southern Land.
The Beer and the Bailiff were gone last night and the “temple” doorstep clean,
And our heads are clear and our hearts are light with wine from the Riverine—
With wine from the Riverine, old man, and I want you to understand
That Bard, Beer and Bailiff too long were kin down here in the Southern Land,
Old man,
Down here in the Southern Land.
It is not because of a larger fee, nor yet that the bards are free,
For the bards I know and the bards I see are married enough for three;
Are married enough for three, old man, and I want you to understand,
They’ve a right to be married enough for four, down here in the Southern Land,
My girl,
Down here in the Southern Land.
But I think it’s because a bird went round and twittered in ears of men
That bards have care and the world seems bare as seen from the rhyming den,
And twittered in ears of men, old chaps, and got folks to understand
That a poet is something more than a joke down here in the Southern Land,
Old man,
Down here in the Southern Land.
poem by Henry Lawson
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