Ironworks Gaming Forum

Ironworks Gaming Forum (http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/index.php)

- General Conversation Archives (11/2000 - 01/2005) (http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=28)

- - My Country (http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=89549)

My Country
by Dorothea Mackellar (1885 - 1968)

The love of field and coppice,
Of green and shaded lanes,
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins.
Strong love of grey-blue distance
Brown streams and soft, dim skies -
I know but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror -
The wide brown land for me!

The stark white ring-barked forests,
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon.
Green tangle of the brushes,
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree tops
And ferns the warm dark soil.

Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When sick at heart, around us,
We see the cattle die -
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady, soaking rain.

Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the Rainbow Gold,
For flood and fire and famine,
She pays us back three-fold.
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze ...

A opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land -
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand -
Though earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.

Remember this, Skip?

Quote:

Sounds of Then (This is Australia)

(M.Callaghan)

I think I hear the sounds of then,
And people talking,
The scenes recalled, by minute movement,
And songs they fall, from the backing tape.
That certain texture,that certain smell,

To lie in sweat, on familiar sheets,
In brick veneer on financed beds.
In a room, of silent hardiflex
That certain texture, that certain smell,
Brings home the heavy days,
Brings home the the night time swell,

Out on the patio we’d sit,
And the humidity we’d breathe,
We’d watch the lightning crack over canefields
Laugh and think, this is Australia.

The block is awkward - it faces west,
With long diagonals, sloping too.
And in the distance, through the heat haze,
In convoys of silence the cattle graze.
That certain texture, that certain beat,
Brings forth the night time heat.

Out on the patio we’d sit,
And the humidity we’d breathe,
We’d watch the lightning crack over canefields
Laugh and think that this is Australia.

To lie in sweat, on familiar sheets,
In brick veneer on financed beds.
In a room of silent hardiflex
That certain texture, that certain smell,
Brings forth the heavy days,
Brings forth the night time sweat
Out on the patio we’d sit,
And the humidity we’d breathe,
We’d watch the lightning crack over canefields
Laugh and think, this is Australia.
This is Australia...

[ 03-10-2004, 06:59 AM: Message edited by: Memnoch ]

Mate! Can you tell I'm a little home-sick of late?

Here's one for you then:

Quote:

I Still Call Australia Home

I've been to cities that never close down
From New York to Rio and old London town
But no matter how far
Or how wide I roam
I still call Australia home

I'm always travelin'
And I love bein' free
So I keep leavin' the sun and the sea
But my heart lies waiting over the foam
I still call Australia home

All the sons and daughters spinning 'round the world
Away from their families and friends
Ah, but as the world gets older and colder
It's good to know where your journey ends

And someday we'll all be together once more
When all the ships come back to the shore
Then I realize something I've always known
I still call Australia home

No matter how far
Or how wide I roam
I still call Australia home

*sniff, sniff* [img]graemlins/verysad.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/crying.gif[/img]

This here's the wattle
I's the emblem of our land
You can stick it in a bottle
You can hold it in your hand [img]smile.gif[/img]

Girt by sea you disrespectful imperialist [img]smile.gif[/img]

Quote:

Originally posted by Donut:
Dirt by sea!

All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand -

[img]graemlins/finger2.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/evillaughter2.gif[/img]